973.7L63  M2739 

B8Sch3a 

Schleuter,  Herman 

Abraham  Lincoln  and  the  Working  Class , 
Ten  Cent  Pocket  Series  No.  159 


LINCOLN  ROOM 

UNIVERSITY  OF  ILLINOIS 
LIBRARY 


MEMORIAL 

the  Class  of  1901 

founded  by 

HARLAN  HOYT  HORNER 

and 

HENRIETTA  CALHOUN  HORNER 


TEN  CENT  POCKET  SERIES  NO.  159 
Edited  by  E.  Ha  ideman- Julius 


Abraham  Lincoln 

and  the 

Working  Class 

Herman  SchUuter 


HALDEMAN-JUUUS  COMPANY 
GIRARD,  KANSAS 


N 


APPEAL  POCKET  SERIES  NO.  159 
Edited  by  E.  Haldeman-Julins 


Abraham  Lincoln 

and  the 

Working  Class 

Herman  Schleuter 


APPEAL   PUBLISHING   COMPANY 
GIRARD,  KANSAS 


ABRAHAM  LINCOLN  AND  THE  WORKING 
CLASS. 

1.  The  English  Workingmen  and  the  Civil 
War. 

Of  the  European  countries,  it  was  especially 
England  that  was  affected  by  the  outbreak 
of  the  Civil  War.  As  we  have  seen,  England 
was  connected  with  the  Southern  States  by  a 
bond  of  common  interests.  Its  textile  indus- 
try, which  had  reached  its  highest  develop- 
ment towards  the  close  of  the  fifties,  needed 
the  raw  cotton  of  the  cultivation  of  which  th« 
Southern  States  possessed  a  monopoly.  The 
latter,  owing  to  the  institution  of  slavery, 
were  interested  in  the  importation  of  English 
products  free  of  duty,  while  the  young  manu- 
facturing industry  of  the  North  favored  a 
protective  policy  which  found  actual  expres- 
sion in  the  national  tariff  laws.  It  was  con- 
sequently in  the  interest  of  the  English  middle 
class  that  the  Southern  States  should  form 
an  independent  confederacy  with  tariff  regu- 
lations of  its  own  which  should  grant  England 
undisturbed  free  trade.  Under  such  an  ar- 
rangement the  South  could  supply  England 
with  the  raw  cotton  which  was  so  necessary  to 
it,  and  English  manufacturers  could  export 
their  industrial  products  of  all  kinds  to  the 
Southern  States,  free  of  duty,  and  without 
^jo  amssa-id  aqi  -rapnfl.     •uoi;i^aduioo  jo  itsbj 


4       LINCOLN  AND  THE  WORKING  CLASS 

these  interests  the  early  Abolitionist  impulses 
of  the  ruling  class  in  England  disappeared, 
and  English  intervention  in  favor  of  the  South- 
ern States  was  advocated  in  these  circles. 

Besides  England,  France  also  was  interested 
in  the  events  taking  place  in  the  United 
States.  Textile  industry  was  of  course  far 
less  developed  in  the  Second  Empire  than  in 
Great  Britain,  and  cotton  did  not  play  as  im- 
portant a  role  in  French  politics  as  in  English. 
Nevertheless,  French  textile  workers  were 
also  affected  by  the  scarcity  of  cotton  and 
suffered  severely  from  the  crisis  produced 
thereby.  But  although  their  distress  was  due 
to  the  War  of  Secession,  like  their  English 
comrades  they  stood  by  the  Union  and  op- 
posed Negro  slavery,  and  by  no  means  shared 
their  ruler's  bias  in  favor  of  the  Southern 
slaveholders.  On  the  contrary,  they  took  a 
very  decided  stand  against  them. 

It  was,  however,  not  the  part  which  the  cot- 
ton famine  and  all  it  involved  played  in  France 
that  drove  the  French  Emperor  to  sympathize 
with  the  South.  Louis  Napoleon  was  filled 
with  the  lust  of  conquest  and  aggrandizement. 
He  had  designs  upon  Mexico  that  could  scarce- 
ly be  realized  if  the  United  States  remained  in- 
tact, and  for  this  reason  he  sided  with  the 
Southern  States.  He  would  gladly  have  made 
the  attempt  to  break  the  blockade  of  the 
Southern  ports  proclaimed  by  the  Washing- 
ton Government,  and  he  would  even  have  di- 
rectly intervened  in  favor  of  the  South,  had 
he  not  feared  thereby  to  involve  France  in 
conflicts   of   far-reaching   consequences.     For 


LINCOLN  AND  THE  WORKING   CLASS       5 

this  reason,  he  desired  the  co-operation  of 
England  in  this  enterprise,  and  he  did  his  best 
to  obtain  it. 

In  England  the  government  was  far  more 
dependent  on  public  opinion  than  in  France. 
If  public  opinion  in  Great  Britain  had  really 
demanded  the  recognition  of  the  Southern  Con- 
federacy, if  it  had  demanded  active  interven- 
tion in  its  favor,  the  Government  would  only 
too  willingly  have  obeyed  the  pressure.  But 
in  the  face  of  the  public  opinion  emphatically 
opposed  to  all  intervention  on  the  part  of  Eng- 
land in  the  affairs  of  America,  the  Government 
dared  not  pursue  a  contrary  course.  The  de- 
cision consequently  lay  with  England. 

Only  a  few  years  had  passed  since  England, 
on  the  occasion  of  the  visit  of  Harriet  Beecher 
Stowe,  the  author  of  Uncle  Tom's  Cabin,  the 
book  which  graphically  described  the  suffer- 
ings of  Negro  slaves,  melted  in  sentimental 
approval,  especially  since  the  author  was  the 
honored  guest  in  the  most  exclusive  circles  of 
the  English  nobility.  After  the  outbreak  of 
the  Civil  War  not  a  trace  of  this  sentiment 
remained  in  the  hearts  of  the  English  middle 
class.  "Today  [18621  we  find  only  here  and 
there  one  among  the  Englishmen  who  does  not 
fanatically  side  with  the  slave  States,  and  that 
one  probably  has  not  the  courage  to  express 
his  opinions"*     This  was  true  as  far  as  the 


•Lothar  Bucher:  t)ie  Londoner  Industrieausstel- 
lung  von  1862.  Berlin,  1863,  p.  155.  Bucher  evi- 
dentlv  considered  only  the  ruling  class  as  "English- 
men." 


6       LINCOLN  AND  THE  WORKING  CLASS 

ruling  classes  were  concerned,  and  they  indeed 
tried  their  best  to  persuade  the  Government 
to  intervene  in  behalf  of  the  South.  They  ar- 
ranged labor  demonstrations  and  meetings  de- 
claring in  favor  of  the  South  and  of  open  hos- 
tilities against  the  North  for  the  purpose  of 
showing  that  these  sentiments  had  the  backing 
of  English  "public  opinion."  But  under  the 
influence  of  persons,  many  of  whom  subse- 
quently belonged  to  the  General  Council  of  the 
International  Workingmen's  Association,  the 
workingmen  of  England  offered  the  most  de- 
termined opposition  to  the  attempt  of  forcing 
them  into  demonstrations  favoring  the  slave- 
holders. English  workingmen  had  themselves 
become  only  too  well  acquainted  with  slavery 
to  espouse  its  support  in  one  of  its  most  aggra- 
vated forms. 

The  manufacturers  now  resorted  to  intimi- 
dation to  compel  the  workingmen  to  join  in  the 
cry  for  war.  Starvation,  that  ever  ready 
weapon  in  the  hands  of  the  middle  class,  was 
to  force  the  workingmen  of  England  to  de- 
clare for  slavery  in  America  and  thereby  ena- 
ble the  Government  to  say  that  public  opinion 
demanded  its  hostile  intervention  in  behalf  of 
the  South.  The  Civil  War,  and  especially  the 
blockade  of  the  southern  ports  by  Northern 
forces,  had  created  a  scarcity  of  cotton  in  Eng- 
land which,  by  the  way,  was  not  altogether  un- 
welcome to  the  manufacturers.  For  there 
had  been  an  overproduction  in  the  cotton  in- 
dustry of  England  in  I860.  "Its  effects  were 
still  felt  during  the  years  immediately  follow- 
ing. .....     The  demand  for  labor  had  in  con- 


LINCOLN  AND  THE  WORKING  CLASS       7 

sequence  already  been  decreased  here  [in  Black- 
burn, where  in  1860  tnere  were  30,000  mechan- 
ical looms],  months  before  the  effects  of  the 
cotton  blockade  made  themselves  felt.  ..  . 
The  stock  on  hand  [of  the  manufacturers]  of 
course  rose  in  price  as  long  as  it  lasted,  and 
the  alarming  depreciation  which  ordinarily  in- 
evitably accompanies  such  crises  was  thus 
avoided."* 

A  temporary  closing  of  factories  thus  sent 
up  the  prices  of  the  accumulated  commodities, 
a  situation  by  no  means  deprecated  by  the 
cotton  lords,  especially  since  they  cherished 
the  hope  that  starvation  would  speedily  cause 
the  workingmen  to  adopt  the  views  of  the 
manufacturers  in  regard  to  the  Civil  War  in 
America.  So  the  textile  factories  in  the  north 
of  England  were  shut  down.  More  than  half 
of  the  looms  and  spindles  were  idle.  The 
wages  of  the  spinners  and  weavers  who  con- 
tinued to  be  employed  were  artificially  and 
forcibly  reduced  in  a  manner  which  literally 
led  to  starvation.  The  manufacturers  deliber- 
ately increased  the  misery  into  which  the  work- 
ingmen had  been  thrown  by  the  scarcity  of 
cotton,  hoping  thus  to  drive  them  to  despair 
and  to  demand  the  Government's  intervention 
in  the  American  troubles.  For,  as  the  mid- 
dle-class organs  declared,  the  intervention  of 
England  would  put  an  end  to  their  misery. 

And  this  misery  of  the  workingmen,  especi- 
ally in  the  textile  districts  of  Lancashire,  was 


*Report    on    Factories.      October,    1862,    pp.    28-29. 
Quoted  by  Karl  Marx:    Kapital,  III.,  1,  p.  106. 


8       LINCOLN  AND  THE  WORKING  CLASS 

indeed  alarming.  In  1863,  when  conditions  had 
already  somewhat  improved,  the  weekly  wages 
of  weavers  and  spinners  amounted  to  3s.  4d. 
and  5s.  Id.  Despite  this  low  rate,  these  wages 
Were  still  further  reduced,  particularly  by 
fines.  In  1862  weavers'  wages  ranged  from 
2s.  6d  per  week  up. 

"No  wonder  that,  in  some  parts  of  Lan- 
cashire, a  kind  of  famine  fever  broke  out.* 
....  But  the  working-people  had  to  suffer 
not  only  from  the  experiments  of  the  manufac- 
turers inside  the  mills,  and  of  the  municipali- 
ties outside;  not  only  from  reduced  wages 
and  absence  of  work,  from  want  and  from 
charity,  and  from  the  eulogistic  speeches  of 
Lords  and  Commons.  Unfortunate-  females 
who,  in  consequence  of  the  cotton  famine,  were 
at  its  commencement  thrown  out  of  employ- 
ment, and  have  thereby  become  outcasts  of 
society,  and  now,  though  trade  has  revived 
and  work  is  plentiful,  continue  members  of 
that  unfortunate  class,  and  are  likely  to  con- 
tinue so.  There  are  also  in  the  borough 
more  youthful  prostitutes  than  I  have  known 
for  the  last  25  years."* 

The  workingmen  of  England  were  starving 
with  exemplary  patience.  They  saw  their 
daughters  drift  into  a  life  of  shame  while 
hunger-typhus  decimated  their  own  ranks,  but 
they  would  not  yield  to  the  demands  of  the  bru- 
tal factory  lords.     Not  only  did  they  refuse 


•Marx:    Capital,  L,  p.  283. 

•Report  on  Factories.      October   31,    1865.      Quoted 
by  Marx:    Capital,  I.,  p.  283. 


LINCOLN  AND  THE  WORKING  CLASS       9 

to  fall  into  line  with  the  wishes  of  their  mas- 
ters and  declare  themselves  in  favor  of  the 
South,  but  on  the  contrary  they  declared  them- 
selves as  distinctly  against  such  a  policy.  The 
workingmen  of  England  never  had  better 
leaders  than  at  this  period,  and  on  these  lead- 
ers' advice  they  espoused  the  cause  of  the  abo- 
lition of  Negro  slavery  and  protested  against 
the  intervention  of  the  Government  in  favor 
of  the  South. 

Hardly  had  Lincoln,  after  more  than  a  year 
of  cautious  dealing  with  the  slavery  question, 
intimated  that  the  War  of  Secession  might  be 
transformed  into  a  war  of  Negro  emancipation, 
than  the  workingmen  of  England,  in  hundreds 
of  public  meetings  all  over  the  country,  in  all 
industrial  sections  and  large  cities,  hailed  this 
move  with  enthusiasm  and  demanded  the  ini- 
tiation of  energetic  measures  against  slavery 
and  the  slaveholders.  In  vain  were  the  sneers 
with  which  the  English  ruling  class  com- 
mented on  the  early  defeats  of  the  Union  army, 
in  vain  was  the  hypocritical  attitude  of  Glad- 
stone and  his  colleagues  in  the  Government 
who  sought  to  disguise  their  secret  desire  for 
intervention  by  the  declaration  that  the  Union 
could  never  suppress  the  Rebellion  and  that 
the  Civil  War  meant  only  useless  and  aimless 
bloodshed.  Cheerfully,  even  enthusiastically, 
the  English  workingmen  bore  starvation  and 
misery,  and  protested  more  and  more  loudly 
against  Negro  slavery  and  against  the  in- 
tervention of  their  Government  in  favor  of 
the  Southern  rebels. 

In  the  north  of  the  country,  in  the  cotton 


10     LINCOLN  AND  THE  WORKING  CLASS 

districts,  where  the  manufacturers  attempted 
to  coerce  their  employees  by  starvation,  one 
of  the  active  agitators  in  favor  of  the  Union 
was  Ernest  Jones,  the  champion  and  poet  of 
the  Chartist  movement.  His  eloquence  was  ir- 
resistible, and  his  speeches  against  the  slave- 
holders were  so  impressive  that  the  towns  of 
Ashton  and  Rockdale  had  them  printed  and 
circulated  at  their  own  expense.  When  Jonea, 
before  a  crowded  mass  meeting  at  Blackburn, 
surrounded  by  the  hostile  local  manufacturers 
on  the  platform,  exclaimed.  "Why  did  the 
South  secede?"  one  of  the  latter  replied,  "For 
free  trade,"  whereupon  the  speaker  instantly 
retorted,  "Free  trade  in  what?  Free  trade 
in  the  lash — free  trade  in  the  branding  iron — 
free  trade  in  chains."* 

The  applause  which  broke  forth  from  the 
assembled  workingmen  need  not  be  described. 
The  glowing  eloquence  of  Jones  contributed 
its  share  in  inspiring  the  starving  textile  work- 
ers of  Lancashire  to  persist  in  their  position. 

Let  us  compare  now  with  the  heroism  of  the 
workingmen  of  England  the  contemptible  hy- 
pocrisy of  the  middle  class  and  its  leaders. 
The  same  Gladstone  who  declared  the  attempts 
of  the  North  to  suppress  the  rebellion  of  the 
slaveholders  to  be  futile,  and  who  only  waited 
for  an  opportunity  to  bring  about  an  inter- 
vention of  England  in  favor  of  the  Southern 
States,  this  same  Gladstone  declared  in  a 
speech  that  the  whole  history  of  the  Christian 


•Frederick   Leary:      Ernest   Jones.     London,    188: 
p.   72. 


LINCOLN  AND  THE  WORKING  CLASS     11 

church  could  not  furnish  so  brilliant  an  ex- 
ample of  Christian  resignation  as  that  of  the 
workingmen  of  Lancashire.t  Of  course,  this 
"Christian  resignation"  and  the  exemplary 
patience  of  these  workingmen  were  easily  ex- 
plained. Mr.  Gladstone  himself  would  have 
them,  had  they  become  impatient,  imprisoned 
and  shot  to  pieces  amid  the  applause  of  the 
manufacturers,  who  were  responsible  for  all 
the   misery. 

In  New  York  a  committee  was  formed  for 
the  purpose  of  collecting  money  for  the  starv- 
ing spinners  and  weavers  in  the  north  of  Eng- 
land and  thus  alleviating  their  misery.  The 
"suffering  factory  workers"  of  Blackburn 
addressed  a  letter  to  this  committee  and  "to 
the  inhabitants  of  the  United  States"  beseech- 
ing them  to  furnish  the  means  for  their  emi- 
gration to  the  United  States.  But  the  starv- 
ing workingmen  of  the  north  of  England  were 
of  far  greater  use  to  the  Northern  capitalists 
by  remaining  where  they  were  and  continu- 
ing to  starve  and  heroically  to  protest  against 
the  machinations  of  their  masters  than  by 
coming  to  the  United  States.  So  money  was 
indeed  sent  to  relieve  their  immediate  distress, 
but  Brother  Jonathan  lent  a  deaf  ear  to  their 
entreaties  for  emigration  on"  a  large  scale. 

The  workingmen  of  England  could  count 
even  less  upon  the  encouragement  of  the  rul- 
ing class  of  their  own  country  in  their  plans 
for  emigration.    The  great  mass  of  the  textile 


fBucher,  pp.  156-57. 


12     LINCOLN  AND  THE  WORKING  CLASS 

workers  was  indeed  without  employment  at  the 
time,  but  the  manufacturers  desired  to  retain 
the  skilled  laborers  until  they  should  need 
them  again.  On  March  24,  1863,  a  manufac- 
turer declared  in  the  London  Times: 

"Encourage  or  allow  the  working-power 
to  emigrate,  and  what  of  the  capitalists?  .  .  . 
Take  away  the  cream  of  the  workers,  and 
fixed  capital  will  depreciate  in  a  great  degree, 
and  the  floating  will  not  subject  itself  to  a 
struggle  with  the  short  supply  of  inferior  la- 
bor      We  are  told  the  workers  wish  it 

[emigration].     Very   natural   it   is   that   they 

should    do    so Reduce,    compress    the 

cotton  trade  by  taking  away  its  working-power 
and  reducing  their  wages  expenditure,  say  one 
fifth,  or  five  millions,  and  what  then  would 
happen  to  the  class  above,  the  small  store- 
keepers, and  what  of  the  rents — the  cottage 
rents? Trace  out  the  effects  up- 
ward to  the  small  farmer,  the  better  house- 
holder, and     the  land-owner,  and  say 

if  there  could  be  any  suggestion  more  suicidal, 
to  all  classes  of  the  country,  than  by  enfeeb- 
ling a  nation  by  exporting  the  best  of  its  man- 
ufacturing population,  and  destroying  the 
.  value  of  some  of  its  most  productive  capital 
and  enrichment"* 

The  manufacturers'  cry  of  despair  found  will- 
ing ears.  The  emigration  of  the  workingmen 
was  prevented.  "Parliament  did  not  vote  a 
single  farthing  in  aid  of  emigration,  but  simply 
passed   some   acts   empowering  the   municipal 


'Marx:    Capital,   I.,   pp.   362-363. 


LINCOLN  AND  THE  WORKING  CLASS     13 

corporations  to  keep  the  operatives  in  a  half- 
starved  state — i.  e.,  to  exploit  them  at  less 
than  the  normal  wages."* 

The  municipalities  ordered  public  works. 
The  unemployed  were  set  to  work  on  drain- 
age, roads,  stone  cutting,  paving,  etc.,  and 
drew  relief  from  the  local  authorities.  This 
action  virtually  amounted  to  a  relief  of  the 
manufacturers,  whose  skilled  hands  were  kept 
in  the  country.  Thus  "the  manufacturer,  in 
secret  understanding  with  the  Government, 
prevented  emigration  as  far  as  possible,  partly 
in  order  to  have  instantly  available  their  cap- 
ital which  consisted  in  the  flesh  and  blood  of 
these  workmen,  and  partly  in  order  to  be  sure 
of  the  rent  which  these  workmen  paid  them."t 

Many  of  the  manufacturers  owned  the  houses 
in  which  the  workingmen  employed  by  them 
were  living.  Rent  could  not  be  paid  during 
the  time  there  was  no  work.  The  unpaid 
rent  would  have  been  a  pure  loss  if  the  work- 
ingmen had  succeeded  in  realizing  their  plan 
for  emigration.  Another  reason  which  induced 
the  manufacturers  to  oppose  the  scheme  with 
all  the  means  at  their  disposal  was  the  fact 
that  it  offered  the  workingmen  an  opportunity 
to  escape  from  their  wretched  conditions. 

The  heroic  attitude  of  the  textile  workers  of 
England  during  the  Civil  War  in  America  con- 
stitutes one  of  the  most  glorious  pages  in  the 
history  of  the  working  class  and  must  there- 


*Marx;    Capital,  I.,  p.  364. 

tMarx:    Kapital,  III.,  I.,  pp.  111-115. 


14     LINCOLN  AND  THE  WORKING  CLASS 

fore  be  emphasized  here.  They  suffered, 
starved  and  even  died  for  the  cause  of  Negro 
emancipation  in  America.  And  yet  a  little 
less  patience  would  in  this  case  have  made 
the  workingmen  even  more  heroic.  But  the 
spirit  of  the  Chartists  had  passed,  and  the 
workingmen  of  England  were  now  great  only 
in  passive  resistance.  The  perfidy  of  the  rul- 
ing class  never  challenged  instant  active  re- 
sistance more  than  did  the  conduct  of  the 
English  manufacturers  and  the  English  gov- 
ernment at  the  time  of  the  Civil  War. 

The  meetings  protesting  against  a  war  in 
favor  of  the  Southern  States  had  in  the  mean- 
time been  continued.  It  was  especially  during 
the  late  winter  of  1862  and  of  1863  that  one 
such  meeting  followed  another.  Above  all 
others  the  workingmen  of  London  began  to  be 
aroused.  The  trade  unions  of  the  metropolis 
called  a  meeting  at  St.  James  Hall  for  March 
26th,  which  was  of  special  importance,  and 
the  declarations  of  which  were  recognized  as 
the  expression  of  English  working  class  opin- 
ion. At  this  meeting  a  prominent  part  was 
played  by  W.  R.  Cremer,  then  a  cabinet-maker, 
subsequently  a  member  of  the  General  Coun- 
cil of  the  International  Workingmen's  Asso- 
ciation, and  still  later  one  of  the  champion* 
of  the  international  peace  movement.  John 
Bright  Was  in  the  chair,  and  among  the 
speakers  were  John  Stuart  Mill  and  Prof.  E. 
S.  Beesly.  In  an  address  to  Abraham  Lincoln 
which  was  drawn  up  by  this  monster  meeting 
this  passage  occurs: 

"Though  we  have  felt  proud  of  our  country 


LINCOLN  AND  THE  WORKING  CLASS     15 

yet  have  we  ever  turned  with  glowing 

admiration  to  your  great  Republic,  where  a 
higher  political  and  social  freedom  has  been 
established." 

And  John  Bright  declared: 

"I  am  persuaded that  the  more  per- 
fect the  friendship  that  is  established  between 
the  people  of  England  and  the  free  people  of 
America,  the  more  you  will  find  your  path 
of  progress  here  made  easy  for  you,  and  the 
more  will  social  and  political  liberty  advance 
among  us."* 

Lord  Palmerston,  then  at  the  head  of  the 
English  Government,  was  about  to  declare 
war  against  the  Union.  According  to  the 
testimony  of  Karl  Marx  it  was  this  monster 
meeting  of  the  English  trade  unions,  together 
with  the  general  attitude  of  the  English  work- 
ing class  in  the  matter,  that  prevented  him 
from  carrying  out  his  intention.  The  North- 
ern States  of  America  have  to  thank  the  work- 
ing class  of  England  that  at  that  trying  period 
in  their  conflict  with  the  South  they  were  not 
involved  in  an  additional  war  with  England, 
and  perhaps  also  with  France,  which  would 
have  seriously  imperilled  the  existence  of  the 
Union. 


*Henry    Bryan    Binns:     Abraham    Lincoln.      Lon- 
don,  1907. 


16     LINCOLN  AND   THE  WORKING  CLASS 

2.     Abraham  Lincoln  and  the  Workingmen 
of  England. 

Near  the  end  of  September,  1862,  Lincoln 
issued  a  proclamation  to  the  effect  that  on 
January  1,  1863,  he  would  declare  free  all 
slaves  in  those  States  which  should  then  be  in 
rebellion  against  the  United  States  and  re- 
fuse to  lay  down  their  arms. 

It  was  natural  for  the  ruling  classes  of  the 
South  to  ignore  this  proclamation.  The  South- 
ern States  had  been  enabled  to  maintain  a  few 
good  privateers  for  injuring  Northern  Com- 
merce, aided  and  encouraged  therein  mainly 
by  England,  its  nobility,  shipbuilders  and  mer- 
chants, with  the  Government's  tacit  approval. 
The  slave-holders  had  every  reason  to  expect 
that  the  English  ruling  classes  would  lend  the 
Confederacy  still  further  assistance. 

But  as  we  have  seen,  the  English  working 
class  put  in  its  veto  here.  The  proclamation 
by  Lincoln  of  his  intention  to  abolish  slavery 
by  January  1st  called  forth  great  rejoicing; 
and  although  there  was  heard  here  and  there 
a  note  of  disappointment  because  the  abolition 
of  slavery  was  put  forth  as  a  war  measure 
and  not  as  an  unconditional  condemnation  of 
slavery  on  principle,  great  demonstrations  of 
workingmen  took  place,  alike  in  the  north  and 
the  south  of  England.  In  meetings  at  Lon- 
don and  at  Manchester  it  was  resolved  to 
send  an  address  to  President  Lincoln  express- 
ing the  thanks  of  the  English  workingmen  for 


LINCOLN  AND  THE  WORKING  CLASS 

the  Emancipation  Proclamation  and  encour- 
aging him  in  taking  still  more  decisive  steps. 
Both  meetings  took  place  December  31,  1862. 
The  address  adopted  by  the  London  meeting 
read  as  follows: 

"The  Workingmen  of  London  to  the  President 
of  the  United  States  of  America. 

"To  His  Excellency,  Abraham  Lincoln,  Presi- 
dent of  the  United  States  of  America. 

"Sir:  We  who  offer  this  address  are  En- 
glishmen and  workingmen.  We  prize  as  our 
dearest  inheritance,  bought  for  us  by  the  blood 
of  our  fathers,  the  liberty  we  enjoy — the  liber- 
ty of  free  labor  on  the  free  soil.  We  have 
therefore,  been  accustomed  to  regard  with  ven- 
eration and  gratitude  the  founders  of  the  great 
republic  in  which  the  liberties  of  the  Anglo- 
Saxon  race  have  been  widened  beyond  all  the 
precedents  of  the  old  world,  and  in  which  there 
was  nothing  to  condemn  or  to  lament  but  the 
slavery  and  degradation  of  men  guilty  only  of 
a  colored  skin  or  an  African  parentage.  We 
have  looked  with  admiration  and  sympathy 
upon  the  brave,  generous  and  untiring  efforts 
or  a  large  party  in  the  Northern  States  to  de- 
liver the  Union  from  this  curse  and  shame. 
We  rejoiced,  sir,  in  your  election  to  the  Presi- 
dency, as  a  splendid  proof  that  the  principles 
of  universal  freedom  and  equality  were  aris- 
ing to  the  ascendant.  We  regarded  with  ab- 
horrence the  conspiracy  and  rebellion  by  which 
it  was   sought  at  once  to  overthrow  the   su- 


IS     LINCOLN  AND  THE  WORKING  CLASS 

premacy  of  a  government  based  upon  the  most 
popular  suffrage  in  the  world,  and  to  perpet- 
uate the  hateful  inequalities  of  race.  We  have 
ever  heard  with  indignation  the  slander  that 
ascribed  to  England  sympathy  with  a  rebellion 
of  slaveholders,  and  all  proposals  to  recognize 
in  friendship  a  confederacy  that  boasts  of 
slavery  as  its  cornerstone.  We  have  watched 
with  the  warmest  interest  the  steady  advance 
of  your  policy  along  the  path  of  emancipation; 
and  on  this  eve  of  the  day  on  which  your  proc- 
lamation of  freedom  takes  effect,  we  pray  God 
to  strengthen  your  hands,  to  confirm  your  no- 
ble purpose,  and  to  hasten  the  restoration  of 
that  lawful  authority  which  engages,  in  peace 
or  war,  by  compensation  or  by  force  of  arm, 
to  realize  the  glorious  principle  on  which  your 
constitution  is  founded — the  brotherhood,  free- 
dom, and  equality  of  all  men."* 

On  the  same  day  when  the  workingmen  of 
London  in  mass  meeting  assembled  framed 
the  above  address,  the  workingmen  of  Man- 
chester held  a  meeting  for  the  same  purpose. 
No  less  than  6,000  persons  were  present  in 
the  hall,  the  largest  of  the  city.  The  address 
adopted  here  was  sent  by  the  Mayor  of  Man- 
chester by  special  messenger  to  the  American 
Minister  at  London,  Charles  Francis  Adams. 
The  importance  which  the  American  Minister 
attached  to  this  manifestation  of  the  working- 
men  may  be  gathered  from  the  letter  with 
which  he  forwarded  the  address  to  Secretary 


"Senate  Documents.     Washington,  1863. 


LINCOLN  AND  THE  WORKING  CLASS     19 

of  State  Seward,  in  Washington.  This  letter 
declared: 

"This  meeting  is  in  every  respect  a  most 
remarkable  indication  of  the  state  of  popular 
sentiment  in  Great  Britain.  It  will  doubtless 
make  a  strong  impression  elsewhere,  and,  if 
duly  followed  up,  may  have  the  effect  of  re- 
storing, in  a  degree,  the  amicable  feeling  be- 
tween the  two  countries."* 

The  address,  whose  significance  was  truly 
set  forth  by  this  letter  of  the  minister,  read  as 
follows : 

"Address  to  the   Workingmen  of  Manchester 
to  His  Excellency, 

"Abraham    Lincoln,   President    of   the    United 
States  of  America. 

"As  citizens  of  Manchester,  assembled  at 
the  Free  Trade  Hall,  we  beg  to  express  our  fra- 
ternal sentiments  towards  you  and  your  coun- 
try. 

"We  rejoice-  in  your  greatness,  as  an  out- 
growth of  England,  whose  blood  and  language 
you  share,  whose  orderly  and  legal  freedom 
you  have  applied  to  new  circumstances,  over 
a  region  immeasurably  greater  than  our  own. 
We  honor  your  free  States  as  a  singularly 
happy  abode  for  the  working  millions  where 
industry  is  honored.  One  thing  alone  has, 
in  the  past,  lessened  our  sympathy  with  your 
country   and  our   confidence  in  it;   we   mean 


'Senate  Documents.     Washington,  1863. 


20     LINCOLN  AND  THE  WORKING  CLASS 

the  ascendancy  of  politicians  who  not  merely 
maintained  Negro  slavery,  but  desired  to  ex- 
tend and  root  it  more  deeply.  Since  we  have 
discerned,  however,  that  the  victory  of  the 
free  North  in  the  war  which  has  so  sorely 
distressed  us  as  well  as  afflicted  you,  will 
shake  off  the  fetters  of  the  slave,  you  have 
attracted  our  warm  and  earnest  sympathy. 

"We  joyfully  honor  you,  as  the  President, 
and  the  Congress  with  you,  for  the  many  de- 
cisive steps  towards  practically  exemplifying 
your  belief  in  the  words  of  your  great  foun- 
ders:   'All  men  are  created  free  and  equal.' 

"You  have  procured  the  liberation  of  the 
slaves  in  the  district  around  Washington,  and 
thereby  made  the  centre  of  your  federation 
visibly  free.  You  have  enforced  the  laws 
against  the  slave  trade  and  kept  up  your  fleet 
against  it,  even  while  every  ship  was  wanted 
for  service  in  your  terrible  war.  You  have 
nobly  decided  to  receive  ambassadors  from  the 
Negro  republics  of  Hayti  and  Liberia,  thus  for- 
ever removing  that  unworthy  prejudice  which 
refuses  the  rights  of  humanity  to  men  and 
women  on  account  of  their  color.  In  order 
more  effectually  to  stop  the  slave  trade,  you 
have  made  with  our  Queen  a  treaty,  which 
your  Senate  has  ratified,  for  the  right  of  mu- 
tual search.  Your  Congress  has  decreed  free- 
dom as  the  law  forever  in  the  vast  unoccupied 
or  half-settled  territories  which  are  directly 
subject  to  its  legislative  power.  It  has  of- 
fered pecuniary  aid  to  all  the  States  which 
will  enact  emancipation  locally,  and  has  for- 
bidden your  generals  to  restore  fugitive  slaves 


LINCOLN  AND  THE  WORKING  CLASS     21 

who  seek  their  protection.  You  have  entreated 
the  slave  masters  to  accept  these  moderate 
offers;  and,  after  long  and  patient  waiting, 
you,  as  commander-in-chief  in  tne  army,  have 
appointed  to-morrow,  the  first  of  January,  1863, 
as  the  day  of  unconditional  freedom  for  the 
slaves  of  the  rebel  States.  Heartily  do  we  con- 
gratulate you  and  your  country  on  this  hu- 
mane and  righteous  course. 

"We  assume  that  you  cannot  now  stop  short 
of  a  complete  uprooting  of  slavery.  It  would 
not  become  us  to  dictate  any  details,  but  there 
are  broad  principles  of  humanity  which  must 
guide  you.  If  complete  emancipation  in  some 
States  be  deferred,  though  only  to  a  prede- 
termined day,  still,  in  the  interval,  human  be- 
ings should  not  be  counted  chattels.  Women 
must  have  rights  of  chastity  and  maternity, 
men  the  rights  of  husbands;  masters  the  lib- 
erty of  manumission.  Justice  demands  for 
the  black,  no  less  than  for  the  white,  the  pro- 
tection of  the  law — that  his  voice  may  be  heard 
in  your  courts.  Nor  must  any  such  abomina- 
tion be  tolerated  as  slave-breeding  States 
and  a  slave  market — if  you  are  to  earn  the 
high  reward  of  all  your  services  in  the  appro- 
val of  the  universal  brotherhood  and  of  the 
Divine  Father.  It  is  for  your  free  country 
to  decide  whether  anything  but  immediate  and 
total  emancipation  can  secure  the  most  in- 
dispensable rights  of  humanity,  against  the 
inveterate  wickedness  of  local  laws  and  local 
executives. 

"We  implore  you,  for  your  own  honor  and 
welcome,  not  to  faint  in  your  providential  mis- 


22     LINCOLN  AND  THE   WORKING  CLASS 

sion.  While  your  enthusiasm  is  aflame,  and 
the  tide  of  events  runs  high,  let  the  work  be 
finished  effectually.  Leave  no  root  of  bitter- 
ness to  spring  up  and  work  fresh  misery  to 
your  children.  It  is  a  mighty  task,  indeed, 
to  reorganize  the  industry,  not  only  of  four 
millions  of  the  colored  race,  but  of  five  mil- 
lions of  whites.  Nevertheless,  the  vast  prog- 
ress you  have  made  in  the  short  space  of 
twenty  months  fills  us  with  hope  that  every 
stain  on  your  freedom  will  shortly  be  removed, 
and  that  the  erasure  of  that  foul  blot  upon 
civilization  and  Christianity — chattel  slavery 
— during  your  Presidency,  will  cause  the  name 
of  Abraham  Lincoln  to  be  honored  and  revered 
by  posterity.  We  are  certain  that  such  a 
glorious  consummation  will  cement  Great  Bri- 
tain to  the  United  States  in  close  and  enduring 
regards.  Our  interests,  moreover,  are  identi- 
fied with  yours.  We  are  truly  one  people, 
though  locally  separate.  And  if  you  have  any 
ill  wishes  here,  be  assured  that  they  are  chiefly 
those  who  oppose  liberty  at  home,  and  that  they 
will  be  powerless  to  stir  up  quarrels  between 
us,  from  the  very  day  in  which  your  country 
becomes,  undeniably  and  without  exception, 
the  home  of  the  free. 

"Accept  our  high  admiration  of  your  firm- 
ness in  upholding  the  proclamation  of  free- 
dom." 

On  February  2,  1863,  Lincoln  sent  the  fol- 
lowing letter  in  answer  to  the  address  of  the 
London  workingmen: 

"To  the  workingmen  of  London:  I  have  re- 
ceived the  New  Year's  address  which  you  have 


LINCOLN  AND  THE  WORKING  CLASS     23 

sent  me,  with  a  sincere  appreciation  of  the  ex- 
alted and  humane  sentiments  by  which  it  was 
inspired. 

"As  these  sentiments  are  manifestly  the 
enduring  support  of  the  free  institutions  of 
England,  so  I  am  sure  also  that  they  constitute 
the  only  reliable  basis  for  free  institutions 
throughout  the  world. 

"The  resources,  advantages  and  powers  of 
the  American  people  are  very  great,  and  they 
have  consequently  succeeded  to  equally  great 
responsibilities.  It  seems  to  have  developed 
upon  them  to  test  whether  a  government  es- 
tablished on  the  principles  of  human  freedom 
can  be  maintained  against  an  effort  to  build 
one  upon  the  exclusive  foundation  of  human 
bondage.  They  will  rejoice  with  me  in  the  new 
evidences  which  your  proceedings  furnish  that 
the  magnanimity  they  are  exhibiting  is  justly 
estimated  by  the  true  friends  of  freedom  and 
humanity  in  foreign  countries. 

"Accept  my  best  wishes  for  your  individual 
welfare,  and  for  the  welfare  and  happiness  of 
the  whole  British  people." 

Abraham  Lincoln."* 

Previous  to  this,  on  January  19th,  President 
Lincoln  had  sent  a  more  comprehensive  reply 
to  the  address  of  the  workingmen  of  Manches- 
ter.    This  reolv  read  as  follows: 


*Senate     Documents.       Third     Session,     37th     Con- 
gress, 1862-18(>y. 


24     LINCOLN  AND   THE   WORKING  CLASS 

"Washington,  January  19,  1863. 
"To  the  Workingmen  of  Manchester,  England: 
"I  have  the  honor  to  acknowledge  the  receipt 
of  the  address  and  resolutions  which  you  sent 
me  on  the  eve  of  the  new  year.  When  I  came, 
on  the  4th  of  March,  1861,  through  a  free  and 
constitutional  election  to  preside  in  the  Gov- 
ernment of  the  United  States,  the  country 
was  found  at  the  verge  of  civil  war.  What- 
ever might  have  been  the  cause  or  whoseever 
the  fault,  one  duty,  paramount  to  all  others, 
was  before  me,  namely,  to  maintain  and  pre- 
serve at  once  the  Constitution  and  the  integ- 
rity of  the  Federal  Republic.  A  conscientious 
purpose  to  perform  this  duty  is  the  key  to  all 
measures  of  administration  which  have  been 
and  to  all  which  will  hereafter  be  pursued. 
Under  our  frame  of  Government  and  my  offi- 
cial oath,  I  could  not  depart  from  this  purpose 
if  I  would.  It  is  not  always  in  the  power  of 
government  to  enlarge  or  restrict  the  scope 
of  moral  results  which  follow  the  policies 
that  they  may  deem  it  necessary  for  the  pub- 
lic safety  from  time  to  time  to  adopt.  I  have 
understood  well  that  the  duty  of  self-preser- 
vation rests  solely  with  the  American  people; 
but  I  have  at  the  same  time  been  aware  that 
favor  or  disfavor  of  foreign  nations  might 
have  a  material  influence  in  enlarging  or  pro- 
longing the  struggle  with  disloyal  men  in  which 
the  country  is  engaged.  A  fair  examination 
of  history  has  served  to  authorize  a  belief 
that  the  past  actions  and  influences  of  the 
United  States  were  generally  regarded  as  hav- 


LINCOLN  AND   THE  WORKING  CLASS     25 

ing  been  beneficial  toward  mankind.  I  have, 
therefore,  reckoned  upon  the  forbearance  of 
nations.  Circumstances  to  which  you  kindly 
allude  induce  me  especially  to  expect  that  if 
justice  and  good  faith  should  be  practiced 
by  the  United  States,  they  would  encounter 
no  hostile  influence  on  the  part  of  Great  Brit- 
ain. It  is  now  a  pleasant  duty  to  acknowledge 
the  demonstration  you  have  given  of  your  de- 
sire that  a  spirit  of  amity  and  peace  toward 
this  country  may  prevail  in  the  councils  of 
your  Queen,  who  is  respected  and  esteemed 
in*  your  own  country  only  more  than  she  is 
by  the  kindred  nation  which  has  its  home  on 
this  side  of  the  Atlantic.  I  know  and  deeply 
deplore  the  sufferings  which  the  workingmen 
at  Manchester,  and  in  all  Europe,  are  called 
to  endure  in  this  crisis.  It  has  been  often  and 
studiously  represented  that  the  attempt  to 
overthrow  this  Government,  which  was  built 
upon  the  foundation  of  human  rights,  and  to 
substitute  for  it  one  which  should  rest  ex- 
clusively on  the  basis  of  human  slavery,  was 
likely  to  obtain  the  favor  of  Europe.  Through 
the  action  of  our  disloyal  citizens,  the  work- 
ingmen of  Europe  have  been  subjected  to  se- 
vere trials,  for  the  purpose  of  forcing  their 
sanction  to  that  attempt.  Under  the  circum- 
stances, I  cannot  but  regard  your  decisive  utter- 
ances upon  the  question  as  an  instance  of 
sublime  Christian  heroism  which  has  not  been 
surpassed  in  any  age  or  in  any  country.  It  is 
indeed  an  energetic  and  reinspiring  assurance 
of  the  inherent  power  of  truth,  and  of  the 
ultimate  and  universal  triumph  of  justice, 


the 


26     LINCOLN  AND   THE   WORKING  CLASS 

manity  and  freedom.  I  do  not  doubt  that  the 
sentiments  you  have  expressed  will  be  sus- 
tained by  your  great  nation;  and,  on  the  other 
hand,  I  have  no  hesitation  in  assuring  you 
that  they  will  excite  admiration,  esteem  and  the 
most  reciprocal  feelings  of  friendship  among 
the  American  people.  I  hail  this  interchange 
of  sentiment,  therefore,  as  an  augury  that 
whatever  else  may  happen,  whatever  misfor- 
tune may  befall  your  country  or  my  own,  the 
peace  and  friendship  which  now  exists  be- 
tween the  two  nations  will  be,  as  it  shall #be 
my  desire  to  make  them,  perpetual. 

Abraham  Lincoln."* 

On  the  26th  of  February  the  Senate  adopted 
a  resolution!  requesting  that  the  correspon- 
dence between  President  Lincoln  and  the  Work- 
ingmen  of  England  be  laid  before  it.  This  was 
done,  and  on  March  2d  the  Senate  ordered  it 
sent  to  the  printer  and  incorporated  in  the 
Senate   Documents.** 

President  Lincoln's  letter  to  the  working- 
men  of  Manchester  recognizes  the  sacrifices 
which  the  workingmen  of  England  made  in 
behalf  of  the  Union,  and  mentions  the  sub- 
lime heroism  shown  by  them,  "unsurpassed  in 
any  age  or  land."  The  polite  phrases  in  re- 
gard to  the  persons  at  the  head  of  the  English 
Government  were  probably  inserted  for  diplo- 


*Senate    Documents.      1863. 
tCon,jressional    Globe.      February   26,   1863. 
**Senate    Documents.      Third    Session,    37th    Con- 
gress,   1862-63. 


LINCOLN  AND  THE  WORKING  CLASS     27 

ma  tic  reasons.  It  was  really  the  English 
working  class  alone  that  merited  the  gratitmde 
of  the  Union. 


28     LINCOLN  AND  THE  WORKING  CLASS* 


3.    Lincoln's  Attitude  towards  the  Work- 
ing Class. 

Next  to  Washington,  of  all  the  Presidents, 
Lincoln  ranks  highest  in  the  esteem  of  the 
American  people.  It  is  not  only  his  relation  to 
Negro  emancipation  and  his  tragic  death  that 
have  made  him  the  national  hero  of  this  coun- 
try. Mythical  tradition  also  has  so  glorified 
him  that  he  is  now  celebrated  for  views  which 
he  did  not  hold. 

Mythical  tradition  has  especially  transfig- 
ured Lincoln's  attitude  towards  the  work- 
ing class.  He  has  been  credited  with  pro- 
phetic expressions  favoring  the  inference  that 
he  foresaw  the  dominion  of  capitalist  corpora- 
tions and  entertained  the  fear  that  all  wealth 
would  become  concentrated  in  a  few  hands, 
to  the  great  peril  of  the  Republic.  Utterances 
have  been  ascribed  to  him  counselling  the 
working  class  to  guard  well  the  political  rights 
which  they  possess  and  not  to  allow  such  rights 
to  be  wrested  from  them.  He  is  even  said  to 
have  had  the  economic  wisdom  to  declare  that 
every  government  should  strive  to  secure  for 
every  workingman,  as  far  as  possible,  the 
entire  product  of  his  labor.  In  short,  Lincoln 
was  represented  as  a  man  who  had  excogitated 
for  himself  a  clear  view  of  the  economic  evolu- 
tion of  society,  alike  in  the  present  and  the 
future,  who  distinctly  recognized  the  part  which 
the  working  class  would  play  in  this  evolution, 
whose  sympathies  were  entirely  with  the  work- 
ing   class,   and    who    ^ised    a    warning   voice 


LINCOLN  AND  THE  WORKING  CLASS     29 

against  the  "money  power." 

Lincoln  did  not  possess  this  knowledge  of 
economic  evolution;  he  had  no  idea  of  the  his- 
toric part  the  working  class  is  called  to  play; 
he  had  no  idea  even  of  the  special  significance 
of  the  labor  movement,  and  his  sympathies 
were  not  with  the  workingmen,  in  so  far  as 
they  voiced  the  demands  of  a  separate  class. 
Lincoln  has  been  extolled  as  a  friend  of  the 
workingmen,  as  almost  a  Socialist,  the  So- 
cialist press  of  the  United  States  even  join- 
ing in  the  chorus  of  praise.  This  praise  has 
been  possible  only  because  sentiments  have 
been  ascribed  to  him  which  he  never  uttered, 
and  because  certain  expressions  used  by  him 
have  been  distorted  or  falsified  into  their 
direct  opposite.* 


*An  ingenious  fabrication  of  utterances  on  labor 
purporting  to  be  Lincoln's  has  been  printed  and 
circulated  by  the  thousand  in  every  part  of  the  Uni- 
ted States.  It  consists  of  five  paragraphs,  the  last 
four  of  which  are  more  or  less  genuine,  but  are 
distorted  out  of  their  meaning.  The  first  paragraph 
begins,  "I  see  in  the  near  future  a  crisis  approach- 
ing that  unnerves  me."  The  whole  fabrication  wai 
analyzed  by  W.  J.  Ghent  In  Collier's  Weekly  for 
April  1,  1905.  Of  the  first  paragraph  Mr.  Ghent 
writes: 

"[It]  is  almost  certainly  a  forgery.  The  style  is 
not  Lincoln's,  nor  in  so  far  as  any  one  can  now 
say,  are  the  sentiments.  Nowhere  among  his  au- 
thenticated utterances  is  there  to  be  found  anything 
resembling  either  the  form  or  the  substance  of  this 
paragraph.  No  one  has  ever  been  able  to  show 
the  original  in  Lincoln's  hand,  and  repeated  de- 
mands for  its  production  have  met  only  vague  as- 
sertions of  its  existence  in  some  other  and  generally 
remote   place." 


30     LINCOLN  AND  THE  WORKING  CLASS 

Apart  from  his  sentiments  in  regard  to 
slavery,  there  are  but  few  among  Lincoln*! 
numerous  spoken  and  written  utterances  which 
deal  with  the  labor  question.  In  none  of  these 
utterances  did  he  declare  himself  in  favor  of 
the  working ,  class  and  its  special  demands 
as  antagonistic  to  the  other  classes  of  the  pop- 
ulation. On  the  contrary,  he  always  avoided 
recognizing  such  antagonisms.  At  Cincinnati, 
on  February  12,  1861,  he  addressed  a  meeting 
of  German  workingmen.  When  the  chairman 
declared  it  as  the  sense  of  those  present  that 
the  working  class  must  be  the  foundation^  of  all 
government,  Lincoln  cautiously  remarked: 

"I  agree  with  you,  Mr.  Chairman,  that  the 
workingmen  are  the  basis  of  all  government, 
for  the  plain  reason  that  they  are  the  more 
numerous,  and  as  you  added,  that  those  were 
the  sentiments  of  the  gentlemen  present,  rep- 
resenting not  only  the  working  class,  but  citi- 
zens of  other  callings  than  those  of  the  me- 
chanic, I  am  happy  to  concur  with  you  in  these 
sentiments." 

Even  before  this,  in  March,  1860,  Lincoln 
had  expressed  himself  in  regard  to  the  labor 
movement.  The  campaign  had  taken  him  to 
New  England,  where  the  struggles  of  the  work- 
ingmen presented  themselves  to  him  more 
forcibly  than  elsewhere.  In  Massachusetts 
there  was  in  progress  a  strike  of  the  shoe- 
makers which  Senator  Douglas  had  repre- 
sented as  a  consequence  "of  this  unfortunate 
sectional  warfare"  between  the  North  and  the 
South.  In  a  speech  at  Hartford,  Conn.,  on 
March  5,  1860,  Lincoln  challenged  the  ridicu- 


LINCOLN  AND  THE  WORKING  CLASS     31 

lous  statement  of  Douglas,  saying  he  "thanked 
God  that  we  have  a  system  of  labor  where 
there  can  be  a  strike.  Whatever  the  pressure, 
there  is  a  point  where  the  workingman  may 
stop."  Here,  too,  Lincoln  added  cautiously 
that  he  did  not  pretend  to  be  familiar  with  the 
subject  of  the  shoe  strike.  "If  you  give  up 
your  convictions  and  call  slavery  right,  as  they 
do,  you  let  slavery  in  upon  you — instead  of 
white  laborers  who  can  strike,  you'll  soon  have 
black  laborers  who  can't  strike."* 

In  a  speech  at  New  Haven,  Conn.,  on  the 
following  day,  Lincoln  returned  to  the  subject, 
saying: 

"I  am  glad  to  see  that  a  system  of  labor  pre- 
vails in  New  England  under  which  laborers  can 
strike  when  they  want  to,  where  they  are  not 
obliged  to  work  under  all  circumstances,  and 
are  not  tied  down  and  obliged  to  labor  whether 
you  pay  them  or  not.  I  like  the  system  which 
lets  a  man  quit  when  he  wants  to,  and  wish  it 
might  prevail  everywhere.  One  of  the  reasons 
why  I  am  opposed  to  slavery  is  just  here.  What 
is  the  true  condition  of  the  laborer?  I  take  it 
that  it  is  the  best  for  all  to  leave  each  man 
free  to  acquire  property  as  fast  as  he  can. 
Some  will  get  wealthy.  I  don't  believe  in  a  law 
to  prevent  a  man  from  getting  rich;  it  would 
do  more  harm  than  good.  So  while  we  do  not 
propose  any  war  upon  capital,  we  do  wish  to 
allow  the  humblest  man  an  equal  chance  to  get 


*J.  G.  Nicolay  and  J.  Hay:    Abraham  Lincoln,  I., 
pp.  615-616. 


32     LINCOLN  AND  THE  WORKING  CLASS 

rich  with  everybody  else.  When  one  starts 
poor,  as  most  do  in  the  race  of  life,  free  so- 
ciety is  such  that  he  knows  he  can  better  his 
condition — he  knows  that  there  is  no  fixed  con- 
dition of  labor  for  his  whole  life.  I  am  not 
ashamed  to  confess  that  twenty-five  years  ago 
I  was  a  hired  laborer,  mauling  rails,  at  work 
on  a  flatboat — just  what  might  happen  to  any 
poor  man's  son.  I  want  every  man  to  have  his 
chance — and  I  believe  a  black  man  is  entitled 
to  it — in  which  he  can  better  his  condition — 
when  he  may  look  forward  and  hope  to  be  a 
hired  laborer  this  year  and  the  next,  work  for 
himself  afterward,  and  finally  hire  men  to 
work  for  him.     That  is  the  true  system."* 

One  may  gather  from  this  speech  that  Lin- 
coln regarded  the  strike  as  a  rightful  weapon 
in  the  struggles  of  the  workingmen,  but  the 
cautious  reserve  with  which  he  discusses  the 
matter  leaves  uncertain  his  attitude  towards 
labor  organizations  and  particularly  towards 
trade  unions. 

The  two  speeches  merely  show  that  Lincoln 
preferred  the  system  of  "free  labor"  to  the 
system  of  slave  labor.  For  the  rest,  it  is  to  be 
seen  from  his  observations  that  he  had  no  com- 
prehension of  the  aims  and  ends  of  the  labor 
movement  or  of  the  special  interests  of  the 
working  class.  The  labor  movement  was  to 
him  a  phenomenon  for  which  he  had  no  under- 
standing and  to  which  he  probably  never  paid 
any  particular  attention. 

After  his  election  to  the  Presidency,  Lincoln 


Nicolay  and  Hay,  L,  pp.   625-626. 


LINCQLN  AND  THE  WORKING  CLASS     33 

discussed  the  question  of  capital  and  labor 
more  thoroughly  in  his  message  to  Congress  of 
December,  1861.  He  took  the  same  position  in 
this  document  which  he  had  set  forth  in  his 
speeches  in  Hartford  and  New  Haven,  and  even 
earlier  in  an  address  at  Milwaukee,  and.  de- 
fended it  in  almost  the  same  language.  This 
message  precisely  defined  Lincoln's  position  in 
relation  to  economic  questions,  and  it  must 
never  be  left  out  of  consideration  if  one  wishes 
to  form  a  true  view  of  the  opinions  of  the  man 
in  regard  to  these  matters. 

Later,  in  the  year  preceding  his  death,  Lin- 
coln made  special  reference  to  the  propositions 
in  this  message,  as  to  a  sort  of  programme  to 
be  submitted  to  workingmen  for  their  consid- 
eration, thereby  making  it  plain  that  he  never 
discarded  the  views  there  laid  down. 

In  New  York,  in  1863,  a  workingmen's  or- 
ganization had  been  formed  under  the  name  of 
the  Republican  Workingmen's  Association  of 
New  York.  This  association  resolved  to  make 
President  Lincoln  an  honorary  member.  A 
committee  was  appointed  and  sent  to  Wash- 
ington for  the  purpose  of  apprising  the  Pres- 
ident of  his  election  to  an  honorary  member- 
ship in  the  association  and  of  submitting  to 
him  an  address.  Lincoln  received  this  commit- 
tee on  March  21,  1864,  and  addressed  them  as 
follows: 

"Gentlemen  of  the  Committee:  The  honorary 
membership  in  your  association,  as  generously 
tendered,  is  gratefully  accepted. 

"You  comprehend,   as   your   address   shews, 


34     LINCOLN  AND  THE  WORKING  CLASS 

that  the  existing  rebellion  means  more,  and 
tends  to  more,  than  the  perpetuation  of  Afri- 
can slavery — that  it  is,  in  fact,  a  war  upon  the 
rights  of  all  working  people.  Partly  to  show 
that  this  view  has  not  escaped  my  attention, 
and  partly  that  I  cannot  better  express  myself, 
I  read  a  passage  from  the  message  to  Con- 
gress in  December,  1861: 

"  'It  continues  to  develop  that  the  insurrec- 
tion is  largely,  if  not  exclusively,  a  war  upon 
the  first  principle  of  popular  government — the 
rights  of  the  people.  Conclusive  evidence  of 
this  is  found  in  the  most  grave  and  maturely 
considered  public  documents  as  well  as  in  the 
general  tone  of  the  insurgents.  In  those  doc- 
uments we  find  the  abridgement  of  the  exist- 
ing right  of  suffrage,  and  the  denial  to  the 
people  of  all  right  to  participate  in  the  selec- 
tion of  public  officers,  except  the  legislative, 
boldly  advocated,  with  labored  arguments  to 
prove  that  large  control  of  the  people  in  gov- 
ernment is  the  source  of  all  political  evil. 
Monarchy  itself  is  sometimes  hinted  at  as  a 
possible  refuge  from  the  power  of  the  people. 

"  'In  my  present  position  I  could  scarcely  be 
justified  were  I  to  omit  raising  a  warning  voice 
against  this  approach  of  returning  despotism. 

"  'It  is  not  needed,  nor  fitting  here,  that  a 
general  argument  should  be  made  in  favor  oi 
popular  institutions;  but  there  is  one  point, 
with  its  connections,  not  so  hackneyed  as  most 
others,  to  which  I  ask  a  brief  attention,  It  it 
the  effort,  to  place  capital  on  an  equal  footing 
with,  if  not  above,  labor,  in  the  structure  of 
government.    It  is  assumed  that  labor  is  avail* 


LINCOLN  AND  THE  WORKING  CLASS     35 

able  only  in  connection  with  capital,  that  no- 
body labors  unless  somebody  else,  owning  cap- 
ital, somehow  by  the  use  of  it  induces  him  to 
labor.  This  assumed,  it  is  next  considered 
whether  it  is  best,  that  capital  shall  hire  la- 
borers and  thus  induce  them  to  work  by  their 
own  consent,  or  buy  them  and  drive  them  to 
it  without  their  consent.  Having  proceeded 
so  far,  it  is  naturally  concluded  that  all  labor- 
ers are  either  hired  laborers  or  what  we  call 
slaves,  and,  further,  it  is  assumed  that  who- 
ever is  once  a  hired  laborer,  is  fixed  in  that 
condition  for  life. 

"  'Now,  there  is  no  such  relation  between 
capital  and  labor  as  assumed;  nor  is  there 
any  such  thing  as  a  free  man  being  fixed  for 
life  in  the  condition  of  a  hired  laborer.  Both 
these  assumptions  are  false,  and  all  inferences 
from  them  are  groundless. 

"  'Labor  is  prior  to,  and  independent  of,  capi- 
tal. Capital  is  only  the  fruit  of  labor  and  could 
never  have  existed  if  labor  had  not  first  ex- 
isted. Labor  is  the  superior  of  capital,  and 
deserves  much  the  higher  consideration.  Capi- 
tal has  its  rights,  which  are  as  worthy  of  pro- 
tection as  any  other  rights.  Nor  is  it  denied 
that  there  is,  and  probably  always  will  be,  a 
relation  between  capital  and  labor,  producing 
mutual  benefits.  The  error  is  in  assuming  that 
the  whole  labor  of  the  community  exists  within 
that  relation.  A  few  men  own  capital,  and 
that  few  avoid  labor  themselves,  and,  with 
their  capital,  hire  or  buy  another  few  to  labor 
for  them.  A  large  majority  belong  to  neither 
class — neither  work  for  others,  nor  have  otheri 


36     LINCOLN  AND  THE  WORKING  CLASS 

working  for  them.  In  most  of  the  Southern 
States  a  majority  of  the  whole  people,  of  all 
colors,  are  neither  slaves  nor  masters;  while 
in  the  Northern,  a  large  majority  are  neither 
hirers  nor  hired.  Men  with  their  families — - 
wives,  sons,  and  daughters — work  for  them- 
selves, on  their  farms,  in  their  houses,  and  in 
their  shops,  taking  the  whole  product  to  them- 
selves, and  asking  no  favors  of  capital  on  the 
one  hand,  nor  of  hired  laborers  or  slaves  on  the 
other.  It  is  not  forgotten  that  a  considerable 
number  of  persons  mingle  their  own  labor  with 
capital,  that  is:  they  labor  with  their  own 
hands,  and  also  buy  or  hire  others  to  labor  for 
them,  but  this  is  only  a  mixed  and  not  a  dis- 
tinct class.  No  principle  stated  is  disturbed  by 
the  existence  of  the  mixed  class. 

"  'Again,  as  has  already  been  said,  there  is 
not,  of  necessity,  any  such  thing  as  the  free 
hired  laborer  being  fixed  to  that  condition  for 
life.  Many  independent  men  everywhere  in 
those  States,  a  few  years  back  in  their  lives, 
were  hired  laborers.  The  prudent  pennilesi 
beginner  in  the  world  labors  for  wages  a  while, 
saves  a  surplus  with  which  to  buy  tools  or  land 
for  himself,  then  labors  on  his  own  account 
another  while,  and  at  length  hires  another  new 
beginner  to  help  him.  This  is  the  just  and 
generous  and  prosperous  system,  which  openi 
the  way  to  all — gives  hope  to  all  and  conse- 
quent energy  and  progress  and  improvement  of 
condition  to  all.  No  men  living  are  more 
worthy  to  be  trusted  than  those  who  toil  up 
from  poverty — none  less  inclined  to  take  or 
touch  that  which  they  have  not  honestly  earned. 


LINCOLN  AND  THE  WORKING  CLASS     37 

Let  them  beware  of  surrendering  a  political 
power  which  they  already  possess,  and  which, 
if  surrendered,  will  surely  be  used  to  close 
the  door  of  advancement  against  such  as  they, 
and  to  fix  new  disabilities  and  burdens  upon 
them,  till  all  of  liberty  shall  be  lost/ 

"The  views  then  expressed  remain  un- 
changed, nor  have  I  much  to  add.  None  are 
so  deeply  interested  to  resist  the  present  rebel- 
lion as  the  working  people.  Let  them  beware 
of  prejudice,  working  division  and  hostility 
among  themselves.  The  most  notable  feature 
of  a  disturbance  in  your  city  last  summer  was 
the  hanging  of  some  working  people  by  other 
working  people.  It  should  never  be  so.  The 
strongest  bond  of  human  sympathy,  outside  of 
the  family  relation,  should  be  one  uniting  all 
working  people,  of  all  nations,  and  tongues, 
and  kindreds.  Nor  should  this  lead  to  a  war 
upon  property,  or  the  owners  of  property. 
Property  is  the  fruit  of  labor;  property  is  de- 
sirable; is  a  positive  good  in  the  world.  That 
some  should  be  rich  shows  that  others  may  be- 
come rich,  and  hence  is  just  encouragement  to 
industry  and  enterprise.  Let  not  him  who  is 
houseless  pull  down  the  house  of  another,  but 
let  him  work  diligently  and  build  one  for  him- 
self, thus  by  example  assuring  that  his  own 
shall  be  safe  from  violence  when  built."* 

It  is  evident  from  this  address  that  Lincoln 
considered  himself  as  belonging  to  the  lower 
middle-class    (petty  bourgeoisie)    and  that  he 


•Nicolay   and   Hay,   pp.    501-502. 


38     LINCOLN  AND  THE  WORKING  CLASS 

was  imbued  by  its  ideals.  Nothing  is  more 
natural,  considering  the  state  of  social  evolu- 
tion in  America  at  that  time  and  Lincoln's  in- 
dividual development.  Lincoln  denies  the  ex- 
istence of  an  industrial  proletariat,  "fixed  to 
that  condition  for  life."  In  the  light  of  hii 
lower  middle-class  experiences  and  ideals  he 
still  saw  for  every  one  the  possibility  of  ad- 
vancement from  wage  worker  to  proprietor. 
His  observations  are  a  glorification  of  the 
lower  middle-class,  the  men  who  are  neither 
capitalists  nor  wage  workers.  The  former 
wage  worker  who  advances  by  his  own  efforts 
and  then  hires  another  beginner  as  a  wage 
worker,  thus  becoming  a  small  employer — such 
is  Lincoln's  ideal.  That  is  to  him  "the  just 
and  generous  and  prosperous  system."  He 
warns  this  stratum  of  the  population,  who  "toil 
up  from  poverty,"  to  beware  of  surrendering; 
their  political  rights  and  their  political  power. 
It  is  not  the  workingmen  whom  Lincoln  coun- 
sels to  vigilance  over  their  political  rights,  but 
the  lower  middle-class.  And  whoever  might 
still  entertain  the  slightest  doubt  concerning 
Lincoln's  position  among  the  classes  constitut- 
ing society,  and  the  distance  by  which  he  wai 
still  separated  from  the  Socialist  point  of  view, 
will  be  set  right  by  the  close  of  his  address  to 
the  New  York  labor  committee,  by  his  glorifi- 
cation of  property  and  its  owners,  and  by  his 
warning  to  workingmen  not  to  "make  war 
upon  property."  If  he  was  at  all  aware  of 
Socialist  views  and  had  formed  an  opinion  con- 
cerning them,  it  must  have  been  a  hostile  one. 
This  was  quite  natural.     The  labor  question 


LINCOLN  AND  THE  WORKING  CLASS     39 

and  its  implications  were  foreign  to  him.  He 
represented  the  farmer  and  the  lower  middle- 
class  with  whom  his  strength  lay,  and  who  at 
that  period  constituted  the  most  powerful 
stratum  of  the  population  of  the  Northern 
States  of  the  Union. 

The  passage  in  Lincoln's  address  to  the  New 
York  labor  committee,  "the  strongest  bond  of 
human  sympathy,  outside  of  the  family  rela- 
tion, should  be  one  uniting  all  working  people, 
of  all  .nations  and  tongues  and  kindreds"  has 
led  some  to  conclude  that  its  author  must  have 
had  an  understanding  of  the  international  sol- 
idarity of  the  working  class  and  of  the  special 
class  solidarity  which  is  peculiar  to  the  labor 
movement  on  a  higher  plane.  It  is  possible 
that  the  heroic  attitude  in  favor  of  the  Union 
assumed  by  the  working  class  of  England  dur- 
ing the  war  had  awakened  in  him  a  slight  un- 
derstanding of  the  class  solidarity  of  working- 
men,  but  it  is  not  probable,  and  we  must  con- 
sider that  beautiful  passage  as  a  mere  mode  of 
expression  without  any  deeper  significance.  If 
one  were  to  draw  inferences  from  a  single 
passage  of  this  kind  as  to  Lincoln's  general 
way  of  thinking  in  regard  to  the  labor  move- 
ment, one  would  have  to  concede  the  right  of 
other  classes  to  derive  precisely  contrary  con- 
clusions from  his  remarks  in  the  speech  at 
New  Haven:  "I  take  it  that  it  is  the  best  for 
all  to  leave  each  man  free  to  acquire  property 
as  fast  as  he  can,"  and  "I  don't  believe  in  a  law 
to  prevent  a  man  from  getting  rich." 

But  there  is  still  another  document  on  the 
strength  of  which  a  claim  has  been  made  for 


40     LINCOLN  AND  THE  WORKING  CLASS 

Lincoln's  approach  to  Socialism.  In  1847  Lin- 
coln had  outlined  a  speech  on  the  protective 
tariff  and  free  trade  which  he  intended  to  de- 
liver in  Congress.  In  this  outline  occur  the 
following  statements : 

"In  the  early  days  of  our  race  the  Almighty 
said  to  the  first  of  our  race,  'In  the  sweat  of  thy 
face  shalt  thou  eat  bread,'  and  since  then,  if 
we  except  the  light  and  the  air  of  heaven,  no 
good  thing  has  been  or  can  be  enjoyed  by  us 
without  having  first  cost  labor.  And  inas- 
much as  most  good  things  are  produced  by 
labor,  it  follows  that  all  such  things  of  right 
belong  to  those  whose  labor  has  produced  them. 
But  it  has  so  happened,  in  all  ages  of  the  world, 
that  some  have  labored,  and  others  have  with- 
out labor  enjoyed  a  large  proportion  of  the 
fruits.  This  is  wrong,  and  should  not  continue. 
To  secure  to  each  laborer  the  whole  product  of 
his  labor,  or  as  nearly  as  possible,  is  a 
worthy  object  of  any  good  government. 

"But  when  the  question  arises,  how  can  a 
government  best  effect  this?  In  our  own 
country,  in  its  present  condition,  will  the  pro- 
tective principle  advance  or  retard  this  object? 
Upon  this  subject  the  habits  of  our  whole 
species  fall  into  three  great  classes — useful 
labor,  useless  labor  and  idleness.  Of  these,  the 
first  only  is  meritorious,  and  to  it  all  the  prod- 
ucts of  labor  rightfully  belong;  but  the  two 
latter,  while  they  exist,  are  heavy  pensioners 
upon  the  first,  robbing  it  of  a  large  portion  of 
its  just  rights.  The  only  remedy  for  this  is 
to,  so  far  as  possible,  drive  useless  labor  and 
idleness  out  of  existence.     And,   first,   as  to 


LINCOLN  AND  THE  WORKING  CLASS     41 

useless  labor.  Before  making  war  upon  this 
we  must  learn  to  distinguish  it  from  useful. 
It  appears  to  me  that  all  labor  done  directly 
and  indirectly  in  carrying  articles  to  the  place 
of  consumption,  which  could  have  been  pro- 
duced in  sufficient  abundance,  with  as  little 
labor,  at  the  place  of  consumption  as  at  the 
place  they  were  carried  from,  is  useless  la- 
bor."* 

On  the  basis  of  these  considerations  Lincoln 
attempted  to  demonstrate  that  it  would  be  use- 
ful labor  to  inaugurate  and  develop  in  the 
South,  where  cotton  is  indigenous,  the  cotton 
spinning  and  weaving  industry.  To  this  end 
he  demanded  the  maintenance  of  the  protective 
tariff. 

He  writes  literally: 

"I  try  to  show  that  the  abandonment  of  the 
protective  policy  by  the  American  Government 
must  result  in  the  increase  of  both  useless 
labor  and  idleness,  and  so,  in  proportion,  must 
produce  want  and  ruin  among  the  people." 

Considered  out  of  their  context,  Lincoln's  in- 
troductory remarks  in  this  outline  might  pro- 
duce the  impression  that  he  indeed  inclined  to- 
wards certain  Socialist  views  according  to 
which  the  product  of  labor  should  belong  to 
him  who  created  it.  It  is  even  not  impossible 
that  Lincoln,  at  the  high  tide  of  the  Fourierist 
movement,  at  the  time  when  he  wrote  his  out- 
line, had  become  acquainted  with  newspapers 
and  pamphlets  containing  similar  propositions 

*Nirolay   and  Hay,   I.,  p.  92  ff. 


42     LINCOLN  AND  THE  WORKING  CLASS 

and  that  he  drew  his  inspiration  from  these. 
It  is  certain  that  he  was  a  reader  of  Greely's 
Tribune.  But  in  the  connection  where  we  find 
it,  the  sentence  "to  secure  to  each  laborer  the 
whole  product  of  his  labor,  or  as  nearly  as  pos- 
sible, is  a  worthy  object  of  any  good  govern- 
ment," cannot  mean  that  the  wage  worker  is 
to  receive  the  product  of  his  labor.  That  labor 
alone  produces  values  was  by  no  means  clear 
to  Lincoln.  In  his  view  the  manufacturer  who 
exploited  a  number  of  men  was  also  doing  use- 
ful work,  and  he,  too,  was  therefore  entitled  to 
the  product  of  his  labor.  The  transport  of  mer- 
chandise he  did  not  consider  as  useful  labor, 
and  the  workingmen  engaged  in  the  transpor- 
tation of  merchandise  were  therefore  not  en- 
titled to  a  share  of  the  product.  Lincoln's  So- 
cialist-sounding phrases  of  1847  by  no  means 
bore  a  Socialist  meaning;  they  could  not  bear 
such  a  meaning  because  their  author  had  no 
conception  of  the  working  class  as  a  well-de- 
fined stratum  of  the  population,  with  economic 
interests  of  its  own  and  with  definite  historical 
aims. 

Abraham  Linclon  was  not  a  Socialist,  nor 
was  he  particularly  friendly  to  workingmen  as 
the  components  of  a  class.  The  ideas  of  the 
modern  working-class  movement  were  to  him 
foreign  ideas  and  remained  so  even  in  his  later 
years.  He  stood  on  the  ground  of  the  lower 
middle-class  and  the  farmer  element,  to  which 
he  himself  belonged.  He  was  a  man  of  his 
age,  with  whose  ideas  he  was  imbued.  He  was 
not  a  man  of  the  future,  and  he  knew  nothing 
of  the  ideas  of  the  future.  And  the  ideas  which 


LINCOLN  AND  THE  WORKING  CLASS     43 

have  been  developed  by  the  labor  movement 
were  to  him  the  ideas  of  a  future  time. 


44     LINCOLN  AND  THE  WORKING  CLASS 


LINCOLN'S  SPEECHES 

GETTYSBURG  ADDRESS 

November  19,  1863 

Fourscore  and  seven  years  ago  our  fathers 
brought  forth  on  this  continent  a  new  nation, 
conceived  in  liberty,  and  dedicated  to  the  pro- 
position that  all  men  are  created  equal. 

Now  we  are  engaged  in  a  great  civil  war, 
testing  whether  that  nation,  or  any  nation  so 
conceived  and  so  dedicated,  can  long  endure. 
We  are  met  on  a  great  battlefield  of  that  war. 
We  have  come  to  dedicate  a  portion  of  that 
field  is  a  final  resting  place  for  those  who  here 
gave  their  lives  that  that  nation  might  live. 
It  is  altogether  fitting  that  we  should  do  this. 

But,  in  a  larger  sense,  we  cannot  dedicate 
— we  cannot  consecrate— we  cannot  hallow — 
this  ground.  The  brave  men,  living  and  dead, 
who  struggled  here,  have  consecrated  it  far 
above  our  poor  power  to  add  or  detract.  The 
world  will  little  note  nor  long  remember  what 
we  say  here,  but  it  can  never  forget  what  they 
did  here.  It  is  for  us,  the  living,  rather,  to  be 
dedicated  here  to  the  unfinished  work  which 
they  who  fought  here  have  Lhus  far  so  nobly 
advanced.  It  is  rather  for  us  to  be  here  dedi- 
cated to  the  great  task  remaining  before  us — 
that  from  these  honored  dead  we  take  increas- 
ed devotion  to  that  cause  for  which  they  gave 


LINCOLN  AND  THE  WORKING  CLASS     45 

the  last  full  measure  of  devotion;  that  we 
here  highly  resolve  that  these  dead  shall  not 
have  died  in  vain;  that  this  nation,  under  God, 
shall  have  a  new  birth  of  freedom;  and  that 
government  of  the  people,  by  the  people,  for 
the  people,  shall  not  perish  from  the  earth. 


FIRST    INAUGURAL   ADDRESS 
March  4,  1861 

Fellow-Citizens  of  the  United  States:  In 
compliance  with  a  custom  as  old  as  the  govern- 
ment itself,  I  appear  before  you  to  address  you 
briefly,  and  to  take  in  your  presence  the  oath 
prescribed  by  the  Constitution  of  the  United 
States  to  be  taken  by  the  President  "before 
he  enters  on  the  execution  of  his  office." 

I  do  not  consider  it  necessary  at  present  for 
me  to  discuss  those  matters  of  administration 
about  which  there  is  no  special  anxiety  or  ex- 
citement. 

Apprehension  seems  to  exist  among  the  peo- 
ple of  the  Southern  States  that  by  the  acces- 
sion of  a  Republican  administration  their  prop- 
erty and  their  peace  and  personal  security  are 
to  be  endangered.  There  has  never  been  any 
reasonable  cause  for  such  apprehension.  In- 
deed, the  most  ample  evidence  to  the  contrary 
has  all  the  while  existed  and  been  open  to  their 
inspection.  It  is  found  in  nearly  all  the  pub- 
lished speeches  of  him  who  now  addresses  you. 
I   do  but  quote  from   one   of   those   speeches 


46     LINCOLN  AND  THE  WORKING  CLASS 

when  I  declare  that  "I  have  no  purpose,  direct- 
ly or  indirectly,  to  interfere  with  tne  institu- 
tion of  slavery  in  the  States  where  it  exists. 
I  believe  I  have  no  lawful  right  to  do  so,  and 
I  have  no  inclination  to  do  so."  Those  who 
nominated  and  elected  me  did  so  with  full 
knowledge  that  I  had  made  this  and  many  sim- 
ilar declarations,  and  had  never  recanted  them. 
And,  more  than  this,  they  placed  in  the  plat- 
form for  my  acceptance,  and  as  a  law  to  them- 
selves and  to  me,  the  clear  and  emphatic  reso- 
lution which  I  now  read: 

"Resolved,  That  the  maintenance  inviolate 
of  the  rights  of  the  States,  and  especially  the 
right  of  each  State  to  order  and  control  its 
own  domestic  institutions  according  to  its  own 
judgment  exclusively,  is  essential  to  that  bal- 
ance of  power  on  which  the  perfection  and  en- 
durance of  our  political  fabric  depend,  and  we 
denounce  the  lawless  invasion  by  armed  force 
of  the  soil  of  any  State  or  Territory,  no  mat- 
ter under  what  pretext,  as  among  the  gravest 
of  crimes." 

I  now  reiterate  these  sentiments;  and,  in 
doing  so,  I  only  press  upon  the  public  atten- 
tion the  most  conclusive  evidence  of  which 
the  ease  is  susceptible,  that  the  property,  peace, 
and  security  of  no  section  are  to  be  in  any 
wise  endangered  by  the  now  incoming  ad- 
ministration. I  add,  too,  that  all  the  protec- 
tion which,  consistently  with  the  Constitution 
and  the  laws,  can  be  given,  will  be  cheerfully 
given  to  the  States  when  lawfully  demanded, 


LINCOLN  AND  THE  WORKING  CLASS     47 

for  whatever  cause — as  cheerfully  to  one  sec- 
tion as  to  another. 

There  is  much  controversy  about  the  deliv- 
ering up  of  fugitives  from  service  or  labor. 
The  clause  I  now  read  is  as  plainly  written  in 
the  Constitution  as  any  other  of  its  pro- 
visions: 

"No  person  held  to  service  or  labor  in  one 
State,  under  the  laws  thereof,  escaping  into 
another,  shall  in  consequence  of  any  law  or 
regulation  therein  be  discharged  from  such 
service  or  labor,  but  shall  be  delivered  up  on 
claim  of  the  party  to  whom  such  service  or 
labor  may  be  due." 

It  is  scarcely  questioned  that  this  provision 
was  intended  by  those  who  made  it  for  the 
reclaiming  of  what  we  call  fugitive  slaves;  and 
the  intention  of  the  lawgiver  is  the  law.  All 
members  of  Congress  swear  their  support  to 
the  whole  Constitution — to  this  provision  as 
much  as  to  any  other.  To  the  proposition, 
then,  that  slaves  whose  cases  come  within  the 
terms  of  this  clause  "shall  be  delivered  up," 
their  oaths  are  unanimous.  Now,  if  they  would 
make  the  effort  in  good  temper,  could  they 
not  with  nearly  equal  unanimity  frame  and 
pass  a  law  by  means  of  which  to  keep  good  that 
unanimous  oath? 

There  is  some  difference  of  opinion  whether 
this  clause  should  be  enforced  by  national  or 
by  State  authority;  but  surely  that  difference 
is  not  a  very  material  one.  If  the  slave  is  to 
be  surrendered,  it  can  be  of  but  little  conse- 
quence to  him  or  to  others  by  which  authority 


48     LINCOLN  AND  THE  WORKING  CLASS 

it  is  done.  And  should  any  one  in  any  case  be 
content  that  his  oath  shall  go  unkept  on  a 
merely  unsubstantial  controversy  as  to  how  it 
shall  be  kept? 

Again,  in  any  law  upon  this  subject,  ought 
not  all  the  safeguards  of  liberty  known  in 
civilized  and  humane  jurisprudence  to  be  in- 
troduced, so  that  a  free  man  be  not,  in  any 
case,  surrendered  as  a  slave?  And  might  it 
not  be  well  at  the  same  time  to  provide  by  law 
for  the  enforcement  of  that  clause  in  the  Con- 
stitution which  guarantees  that  "the  citizens  of 
each  State  shall  be  entitled  to  all  privileges 
and  immunities  of  citizens  in  the  several 
States?" 

I  take  the  official  oath  today  with  no  men- 
tal reservations,  and  with  no  purpose  to  con- 
strue the  Constitution  or  laws  by  any  hyper- 
critical rules.  And  while  I  do  not  choose  now 
to  specify  particular  acts  of  Congress  as  prop- 
er to  be  enforced,  I  do  suggest  that  it  will  be 
much  safer  for  all,  both  in  official  and  private 
stations,  to  conform  to  and  abide  by  all  those 
acts  which  stand  unrepealed,  than  to  violate 
any  of  them,  trusting  to  find  impunity  in 
having  them  held  to  be  unconstitutional. 

It  is  seventy-two  years  since  the  first  in- 
auguration of  a  President  under  our  Na- 
tional Constitution.  During  that  period  fif- 
teen different  and  greatly  distinguished  citi- 
zens have,  in  succession,  administered  the  ex- 
ecutive branch  of  the  government.  They  have 
conducted  it  through  many  perils,  and  general- 
ly with  great  success.    Yet,  with  all  this  scope 


LINCOLN  AND  THE  WORKING  CLASS     49 

of  precedent,  I  now  enter  upon  the  task  for  the 
brief  constitutional  term  of  four  years  under 
great  and  peculiar  difficulty.  A  disruption 
of  the  Federal  Union,  heretofore  only  menaced, 
is  now  formidably  attempted. 

I  hold  that,  in  contemplation  of  universal 
law  and  of  the  Constitution,  the  Union  of 
these  States  is  perpetual.  Perpetuity  is  im- 
plied, if  not  expressed,  in  the  fundamental 
law  of  all  national  government.  It  is  safe  to 
assert  that  no  government  proper  ever  had 
a  provision  in  its  organic  law  for  its  own  ter- 
mination. Continue  to  execute  all  the  express 
provisions  of  our  National  Constitution,  and 
the  Union  will  endure  forever — it  being  impos- 
sible to  destroy  it  except  by  some  action  not 
provided  for  in  the  instrument  itself. 

Again,  if  the  United  States  be  not  a  gov- 
ernment proper,  but  an  association  of  States 
in  the  nature  of  contract  merely,  can  it,  as 
a  contract  be  peaceably  unmade  by  less  than 
all  the  parties  who  made  it?  One  party  to 
a  contract  may  violate — break  it,  so  to  speak; 
but  does  it  not  require  all  to  lawfully  rescind  it  ? 

Descending  from  these  general  principles, 
we  find  the  proposition  that,  in  legal  contem- 
plation the  Union  is  perpetual  confirmed  by 
the  history  of  the  Union  itself.  .  The  Union 
is  much  older  than  the  Constitution.  It  was 
formed,  in  fact,  by  the  Articles  of  Association 
in  1774.  It  was  matured  and  continued  by  the 
Declaration  of  Independence  in  1776.  It  was 
further  matured,  and  the  faith  of  all  the  then 


50     LINCOLN  AND  THE  WORKING  CLASS 

thirteen  States  expressly  plighted  and  engaged 
that  it  should  be  perpetual,  by  the  Articles  of 
Confederation  in  1778.  And,  finally,  in  1787 
one  of  the  declared  objects  for  ordaining  and 
establishing  the  Constitution  was  "to  form 
a  more  perfect  Union." 

But  if  the  destruction  of  the  Union  by  one 
or  by  a  part  only  of  the  States,  be  lawfully 
possible,  the  Union  is  less  perfect  than  before 
the  Constitution,  having  lost  the  vital  element 
of  perpetuity. 

It  follows  from  these  views  that  no  State 
upon  its  own  mere  motion  can  lawfully  get 
out  of  the  Union;  that  resolves  and  ordinances 
to  that  effect  are  legally  void;  and  that  acts 
of  violence,  within  any  State  or  States,  against 
the  authority  of  the  United  States,  are  insur- 
rectionary or  revolutionary,  according  to  cir- 
cumstances. 

I  therefore  consider  that,  in  view  of  the 
Constitution  and  the  laws,  the  Union  is  un- 
broken; and  to  the  extent  of  my  ability  I 
shall  take  care,  as  the  Constitution  itself  ex- 
pressly enjoins  upon  me,  that  the  laws  of  the 
Union  be  faithfully  executed  in  all  the  States. 
Doing  this  I  deem  to  be  only  a  simple  duty 
on  my  part;  and  I  shall  perform  it  so  far  as 
practicable,  unless  my  rightful  masters,  the 
American  people,  shall  withhold  the  requisite 
means,  or  in  some  authoritative  manner  direct 
the  contrary.  I  trust  this  will  not  be  regarded 
as  a  menace,  but  only  as  the  declared  purpose 
of  the  Union  that  it  will  constitutionally  de- 


LINCOLN  AND  THE  WORKING  CLASS     51 

fend  and  maintain  itself. 

In  doing  this  there  needs  to  be  no  blood- 
shed or  violence;  and  there  shall  be  none,  un- 
less it  be  forced  upon  the  national  authority 
The  power  confided  to  me  will  be  used  to 
hold,  occupy  and  possess  the  property  and 
places  belonging  to  the  government,  and  to 
collect  the  duties  and  imposts;  but  beyond 
what  may  be  necessary  for  these  objects, 
there  will  be  no  invasion,  no  using  of  force 
against  or  among  the  people  anywhere.  Where 
hostility  to  the  United  States,  in  any  interior 
locality,  shall  be  so  great  and  universal  as  to 
prevent  competent  resident  citizens  from  hold- 
ing the  Federal  offices,  there  will  be  no  at- 
tempt to  force  obnoxious  strangers  among  the 
people  for  that  object.  While  the  strict  legal 
right  may  exist  in  the  government  to  enforce 
the  exercise  of  these  offices,  the  attempt  to  do 
so  would  be  so  irritating,  and  so  nearly  im- 
practicable withal,  that  I  deenu  it  better  to 
forego  for  the  time  the  uses  of  such  offices. 

The  mails,  unless  repelled,  will  continue 
to  be  furnished  in  all  parts  of  the  Union.  So 
far  as  possible,  the  people  everywhere  3hall 
have  that  sense  of  perfect  security  which  is 
most  favorable  to  calm  thought  and  reflec- 
tion. The  course  here  indicated  will  be 
followed  unless  current  events  and  experience 
shall  show  a  modification  or  change  to  be 
proper,  and  in  every  case  and  exigency  my 
best  discretion  will  be  exercised  according  to 
circumstances    actually    existing,    and   with   a 


52     LINCOLN  AND  THE  WORKING  CLASS 

view  and  a  hope  of  a  perfect  solution  of  the 
national  troubles  and  the  restoration  of  frater- 
nal sympathies  and  affections. 

That  there  are  persons  in  one  section  or 
another  who  seek  to  destroy  the  Union  at  all 
events,  and  are  glad  of  any  pretext  to  do  it, 
I  will  neither  affirm  nor  deny;  but  if  there 
be  such,  I  need  address  no  word  to  them.  To 
those,  however,  who  really  love  the  Union  may 
I  not  speak? 

Before  entering  upon  so  grave  a  matter  as 
the  destruction  of  our  national  fabric,  with  all 
its  benefits,  its  memories,  and  its  hopes,  would 
it  not  be  wise  to  ascertain  precisely  why  we  do 
it?  Will  you  hazard  so  desperate  a  step  while 
there  is  any  possibility  that  any  portion  of  the 
ills  you  fly  from  have  no  real  existence  ?  Will 
you,  while  the  certain  ills  you  fly  to  are  great- 
er than  all  the  real  ones  you  fly  from — will 
you  risk  the  commission  of  so  fearful  a  mis- 
take? 

All  profess  to  be  content  in  the  Union  if 
2l)\  constitutional  rights  can  be  maintained. 
Is  it  true,  then,  that  any  right,  plainly  writ- 
ten in  the  Constitution,  has  been  denied?  1 
think  not.  Happily  the  human  mind  is  so  con- 
stituted that  no  party  can  reach  to  the  au- 
dacity of  doing  this.  Think,  if  you  can,  of  a 
single  instance  in  which  a  plainly  written  pro- 
vision of  the  Constitution  has  ever  been  de- 
nied. If  by  the  mere  force  of  numbers  a  ma- 
jority should  deprive  a  minority  of  any  clearly 
written    constitutional    right,    it    might,    in    a 


LINCOLN  AND  THE  WORKING   CLASS     53 

moral  point  of  view,  justify  revolution- -cer- 
tainly would  if  such  a  right  were  a  vital  one. 
But  such  is  not  our  case.  All  the  vital  rights 
of  minorities  and  of  individuals  are  so  plainly 
assured  to  them  by  affirmations  and  negations, 
guarantees  and  prohibitions,  in  the  Constitu- 
tion, that  controversies  never  arise  concerning 
them.  But  no  organic  law  can  ever  be  framed 
with  a  provision  specifically  applicable  to 
every  question  which  may  occur  in  practical 
administration.  No  foresight  can  anticipate, 
nor  any  document  of  reasonable  length  con- 
tain, express  provisions  for  all  possible  ques- 
tions. Shall  fugitives  from  labor  be  surrender- 
ed by  national  or  by  State  authority?  The 
Constitution  does  not  expressly  say.  May 
Congress  prohibit  slavery  in  the  Territories? 
The  Constitution  does  not  expressly  say.  Must 
Congress  protect  slavery  in  the  Territories? 
The  Constitution  does  not  expressly  say. 

From  questions  of  this  class  spring  all  our 
constitutional  controversies,  and  we  divide 
upon  them  into  majorities  and  minorities.  If 
the  minority  will  not  acquiesce,  the  majority 
must,  or  the  government  must  cease.  There 
is  no  other  alternative;  for  continuing  the  gov- 
ernment is  acquiescence  on  one  side  or  the 
other. 

If  a  minority  in  such  case  will  secede  rather 
than  acquiesce,  they  make  a  precedent  which 
in  turn  will  divide  and  ruin  them;  for  a  mi- 
nority of  their  own  will  secede  from  them 
whenever  a  majority  refuses  to  be  controlled 


54     LINCOLN  AND  THE  WORKING  CLASS 

by  such  minority.  For  instance,  why  may 
not  any  portion  of  a  new  confederacy  a  year 
or  two  hence  arbitrarily  secede  again,  precise- 
ly as  portions  of  the  present  Union  now  claim 
to  secede  from  it?  All  who  cherish  disunion 
sentiments  are  now  being  educated  to  the 
exact  temper  of  doing  this. 

Is  there  such  perfect  identity  of  instincts 
among  the  States  to  compose  a  new  Union, 
as  to  produce  harmony  only,  and  prevent  re- 
newed secession? 

Plainly,  the  central  idea  of  secession  is  the 
essence  of  anarchy.  A  majority  held  in  re- 
straint by  constitutional  checks  and  limita- 
tions, and  always  changing  easily  with  de- 
liberate changes  of  popular  opinions  and  senti- 
ments, is  the  only  true  sovereign  of  a  free 
people.  Whoever  rejects  it  does,  of  necessity, 
fly  to  anarchy  or  to  despotism.  Unanimity 
is  impossible;  the  rule  of  a  minority,  as  a  per- 
manent arrangement,  is  wholly  inadmissible; 
so  that,  rejecting  the  majority  principle,  an- 
archy or  despotism  in  some  form  Is  all  that 
is  left. 

I  do  not  forget  the  position,  assumed  by 
some,  that  constitutional  questions  are  to  be 
decided  by  the  Supreme  Court;  nor  do  I  deny 
that  such  decisions  must  be  binding,  in  any 
case,  upon  the  parties  to  a  suit,  as  to  the 
object  of  that  suit,  while  they  are  also  en- 
titled to  very  high  respect  and  consideration 
in  all  parallel  cases  by  all  other  departments 
of  the  government.       And  while  it  is  obviously 


LINCOLN  AND  THE  WORKING  CLASS     65 

possible  that  such  decision  may  be  erroneous 
in  any  given  case,  still  the  evil  effect  follow- 
ing it,  being  limited  to  that  particular  case, 
with  the  chance  that  it  may  be  overruled  and 
never  become  a  precedent  for  other  cases,  can 
better  be  borne  than  could  the  evils  of  a  dif- 
ferent practice.  At  the  same  time,  the  can- 
did citizen  must  confess  that  if  the  policy  of 
the  government,  upon  vital  questions  affecting 
the  whole  people,  is  to  be  irrevocably  fixed  by 
decision  of  the  Supreme  Court,  the  instant 
they  are  made,  in  ordinary  litigation  between 
parties  in  personal  actions,  the  people  will 
have  ceased  to  be  their  own  rulers,  having  to 
that  extent  practically  resigned  their  govern- 
ment into  the  hands  of  that  eminent  tribunal. 
Nor  is  there  in  this  view  any  assault  upon  the 
court  or  the  judges.  It  is  a  duty  from  which 
they  may  not  shrink  to  decide  cases  properly 
brought  before  them,  and  it  is  no  fault  of 
theirs  if  others  seek  to  turn  their  decisions 
to  political  purposes. 

One  section  of  our  country  believes  slav- 
ery is  right,  and  ought  to  be  extended,  while 
the  other  believes  it  is  wrong,  and  ought  not 
to  be  extended.  This  is  the  only  substantial 
dispute.  The  fugitive-slave  clause  of  the  Con- 
stitution, and  the  law  for  the  suppression  of 
the  foreign  slave-trade,  are  each  as  well  en- 
forced, perhaps,  as  any  law  can  ever  be  in  a 
community  where  moral  sense  of  the  people 
imperfectly  supports  the  law  itself.  The  great 
body  of  the  people  abide  by  the  dry  legal  obli- 


56     LINCOLN  AND  THE  WORKING  CLASS 

gation  in  both  cases,  and  a  few  break  over 
in  each.  This,  I  think,  cannot  be  perfectly 
cured:  and  it  would  be  worse  in  both  cases 
after  the  separation  of  the  sections  than  be- 
fore. The  foreign  slave-trade,  now  imper- 
fectly suppressed,  would  be  ultimately  revived, 
without  restriction,  in  one  section,  while  fugi- 
tive slaves,  now  only  partially  surrendered, 
would  not  be  surrendered  at  all  by  the  other. 

Physically  speaking,  we  cannot  separate. 
We  cannot  remove  our  respective  sections 
from  each  other,  nor  build  an  impassable  wall 
between  them.  A  husband  and  wife  may  be 
divorced,  and  go  out  of  the  presence  and  be- 
yond the  reach  , of  each  other;  but  the. differ- 
ent parts  of  our  country  cannot  do  this.  They 
cannot  but  remain  face  to  face,  and  inter- 
course, either  amicable  or  hostile,  must  con- 
tinue between  them.  Is  it  possible,  then,  to 
make  that  intercourse  more  advantageous  or 
more  satisfactory  after  separation  than  be- 
fore? Can  aliens  make  treaties  easier  than 
friends  can  make  laws?  Can  treaties  be  more 
faithfully  enforced  between  aliens  than  laws 
can  among  friends?  Suppose  you  go  to  war. 
you  cannot  fight  always;  and  when,  after 
much  loss  on  both  sides,  and  no  gain  on  either, 
you  cease  fighting,  the  identical  old  questions 
as  to  terms  of  intercourse  are  again  upon  you. 

This  country,  with  its  institutions,  belongs 
to  the  people  who  inhabit  it.  Whenever  they 
shall  grow  weary  of  the  existing  government, 
they  ran  exercise  their  constitutional  right  of 


LINCOLN  AND  THE  WORKING  CLASS     57 

amending  it,  or  their  revolutionary  right  to 
dismember  or  overthrow  it.  I  cannot  be 
ignorant  of  the  fact  that  many  worthy  and 
patriotic  citizens  are  desirous  of  having  the 
National  Constitution  amended.  While  I  make 
no  recommendation  of  amendments,  I  fully 
recognize  the  rightful  authority  of  the  people 
over  the  whole  subject,  to  be  exercised  in 
either  of  the  modes  prescribed  in  the  instru- 
ment itself;  and  I  should,  under  existing  cir- 
cumstances, favor  rather  than  oppose  a  fair 
opportunity  being  afforded  the  people  to  act 
upon  it.  I  will  venture  to  add  that  to  me  the 
convention  mode  seems  preferable,  in  that 
it  allows  amendments  to  originate  with  the 
people  themselves,  instead  of  only  permitting 
them  to  take  or  reject  propositions  originated 
by  others  not  especially  chosen  for  the  pur- 
pose, and  which  might  not  be  precisely  such 
as  they  would  wish  to  either  accept  or  refuse. 
I  understand  a  proposed  amendment  to  the 
Constitution — which  amendment,  however,  I 
have  not  seen — has  passed  Congress,  to  the 
effect  that  the  Federal  Government  shall  never 
interfere  with  the  domestic  institutions  of  the 
States,  including  that  of  persons  held  to  ser- 
vice. To  avoid  misconstruction  of  what  I  have 
said,  I  depart  from  my  purpose  not  to  speak 
of  particular  amendments  so  far  as  to  say 
that,  holding  such  a  provision  to  now  be  im- 
plied constitutional  law,  I  have  no  objection 
to  its  being  made  express  and  irrevocable. 
The  chief  magistrate  derives  all  his  author- 


58     LINCOLN  AND  THE  WORKING  CLASS 

ity  from  the  people,  and  they  have  con- 
ferred none  upon  him  to  fix  terms  for  the  sep- 
aration of  the  States.  The  people  themselves 
can  do  this  also  if  they  choose;  but  the  execu- 
tive, as  such,  has  nothing  to  do  with  it.  His 
duty  is  to  administer  the  present  government, 
as  it  came  to  his  hands,  and  to  transmit  it,  un- 
impaired by  him,  to  his  successor. 

Why  should  there  not  be  a  patient  confi- 
dence in  the  ultimate  justice  of  the  people? 
Is  there  any  better  or  equal  hope  in  the  world  ? 
In  our  present  differences  is  either  party  with- 
out faith  of  being  in  the  right?  If  the  Al- 
mighty Ruler  of  Nations,  with  nis  eternal 
truth  and  justice,  be  on  your  side  of  the  North, 
or  on  yours  of  the  South,  that  truth  and  justice 
will  surely  prevail  by  the  judgment  of  this 
great  tribunal  of  the  American  people. 

By  the  frame  of  the  government  under 
which  we  live,  this  same  people  have  wisely 
given  their  public  servants  but  little  power 
for  mischief;  and  have,  with  equal  wisdom, 
provided  for  the  return  of  that  little  to  their 
own  hands  at  very  short  intervals.  While  the 
people  retain  their  virtue  and  vigilance,  no 
administration,  by  any  extreme  of  wickedness 
or  folly,  can  very  seriously  injure  the  govern- 
ment in  the  short  space  of  four  years. 

My  countrymen,  one  and  all,  think  calmly 
and  well  upon  this  whole  subject.  Nothing 
valuable  can  be  lost  by  taking  time.  If  there 
be  an  object  to  hurry  any  of  you  in  hot  haste 
to  a  step  which  you  would  never  take  deliber- 


LINCOLN  AND  THE  WORKING   CLASS     59 

ately,  that  object  will  be  frustrated  by  taking 
time;  but  no  good  object  can  be  frustrated  by 
it.  Such  of  you  as  are  now  dissatisfied,  still 
have  the  old  Constitution  unimpaired,  and,  on 
the  sensitive  point,  the  laws  of  your  own  fram- 
ing under  it;  while  the  new  administration  will 
have  no  immediate  power,  if  it  would,  to 
change  either.  If  it  were  admitted  that  you 
who  are  dissatisfied  hold  the  right  side  in  the 
dispute,  there  still  is  no  single  good  reason 
for  precipitate  action.  Intelligence,  patriot- 
ism, Christianity,  and  a  firm  reliance  on  Him 
who  has  never  yet  forsaken  this  favored  land, 
are  still  competent  to  adjust  in  the  best  way 
all  our  present  difficulty. 

In  your  hands,  my  dissatified  fellow  coun- 
trymen, and  not  in  mine,  is  the  momentous 
issue  of  civil  war.  The  government  will  not 
assail  you.  You  can  have  no  conflict  without 
being  yourselves  the  aggressors.  You  have 
no  oath  registered  in  heaven  to  destroy  the 
government,  while  I  shall  have  the  most  sol- 
emn one  to  "preserve,  protect,  and  defend  it." 

I  am  loath  to  close.  We  are  not  enemies, 
but  friends.  We  must  not  be  enemies. 
Though  passion  may  have  strained,  it  must 
not  break  our  bonds  of  affection.  The  mys- 
tic chords  of  memory,  stretching  from  every 
battle-field  and  patriot  grave  to  every  living 
heart  and  hearthstone  all  over  this  broad  land, 
will  yet  swell  the  chorus  of  the  Union  when 
again  touched,  as  surely  they  will  be,  by  the 
better  angels  of  our  nature. 


Other  Titles  in  Pocket  Series 


1  Rubaiyat   of    Omar 
Khayyam. 

2  Oscar   Wilde's  Ballad 
of  Reading  Jail. 

8  Eighteen   Little   Essays. 
"Voltaire. 

6  De  Maupassant's  Stories 

7  A    Liberal   Education. 
Thomas    Huxley. 

6  Lady  Windermere's 
Fan.      Oscar    Wilde. 

9  Great   English    Poems. 

10  Shelley.     Francis 
Thompson. 

11  Debate   on  Religion   be- 
tween  John   Haynes 
Holmes   and   George 
Bowne. 

l2.Poe's  Tales. 

13  Is  Free  Will  a  Fact  or 

a  Fallacy?     Debate. 
14. What  Every  Girl 

Should    Know.      Mrs. 

Sanger. 

16  Balzac's    Stories. 

17  On    Walking.     Thoreau. 

18  Idle  Thoughts   of   an 
Idle   Fellow.     Jerome. 

19  Nietzsche:  Who  He 
Was  and  What  He 
Stood  For. 

80  Let's  Laugh.     Nasby. 

81  Carmen.     Merimee. 
24  The  Kiss  and  Other 

Stories.    Anton  Chekhov 
E5  Rhyming    Uictionary. 
26  On  Going  to  Church. 

Bernard  Shaw. 


27  Last   Days    of   a   Con- 
demned  Man.     Hugo. 

28  Toleration.     Voltaire. 

29  Dreams.     Schreiner. 

30  What   Life   Means   to 
Me.     Jack   London. 

81  Pelleas    and    Melisande 

Maeterlinck. 
32  Poe's    Poems. 

83  Brann:      Smasher    of 
Shams. 

84  Case  for  Birth  Control 
35  Maxims    of   La 

Rochefoucauld. 
86  Soul   of   Man  Under 
Socialism.     Oscar 
Wilde. 

37  Dream   of  John   Ball 
William   Morris. 

38  Dr.  Jekyll  and  Mr. 
Hyde.     Stevenson. 

89  Did   Jesus   Ever   Live  ? 
Debate. 

40  House   and  the   Brain 
Bulwer    Lytton. 

41  Christmas   Carol. 
Dickens. 

42  From   Monkey   to  Man 

43  Marriage    and    Divorce 
Debate  by   Horace 
Greeley   and   Robert 
Owen. 

44  Aesop's    Fables. 

45  Tolstoi's   Stories. 

46  Salome.     Oscar   Wilde. 

47  He   Renounced   the 
Faith.     Jack    London. 


48  Bacon's  Essays. 

49  Three  Lectures  on 
Evolution.    Haeckel. 

50  Common  Sense. 
Thomas   Paine. 

61  Bruno:    His   Life  and 
Martyrdom. 

52  Voltaire.     Victor   Hugo. 

53  Insects    and    Men ;    In- 
stinct  and   Reason. 
Clarence  Darrow. 

64  Importance    of    Being 
Earnest.    Oscar   Wilde. 

66  Wisdom    of    Ingersoll. 

67  Rip  Van  Winkle. 

58  Boccaccio's   Stories. 

59  Epigrams  of    Wit. 
66  Emerson's    Essay   on 

Love- 

61  Tolstoi's  Essays. 

62  Schopenhauer's     Essays. 
66  Meditations    of    Marcus 

Aurelius. 

68  Shakespeare's     Sonnets. 

70  Lamb's  Essays. 

71  Poems  of  Evolution, 
Anthology. 

72  Color  of  Life.    E.  Hal- 
deman-Julius. 

78  Whitman's    Poems. 

74  On  Threshold  of  Sex. 

75  The   Choice   of   Books. 
Carlyle. 

76  The  Prince  of  Peace. 
Bryan. 

78  How  to  Be  an   Orator. 

John  P.  Altgeld. 
76  Enoch  Arden. 

86  Pillars   of   Society. 
Ibsen. 

81  Oare  of  the  Baby. 

82  Common  Faults  in 

Writing  English. 


83  Marriage:  Its   i.'ast. 
Present  and  Future. 
Besant. 

84  Love  Letters  of  a 
Portuguese  Nun. 

85  Attack  on  the  Mill. 
Zola. 

86  On    Reading.      Georg 
Brandes. 

87  Love:      An    Essay. 
Montaigne. 

88  Vindication    of    Thomas 
Paine.    Ingersoll. 

89  Love    Letters    of    Men 
and   Women   of  Genius. 

91  Manhood:    The  Facts 
of    Life    Presented   to 
Men. 

92  Hypnotism  Made  Plain 

93  How  to  Live  100  Yean 

94  Trial  and  D»nth  of 
Socrates. 

95  Confessions  of  an 
Opium  Eater.  De 
Quincey. 

96  Dialogues  of  Plato. 

98  How   to   Love. 

99  Tartuffe.      Molien. 

100  The   Red   Laugh. 
Andreyev. 

101  Thoughts  of  Paseai. 

102  Tales   of   Sherlock 
Holmes. 

103  Pocket  Theology. 
Voltaire. 

104  Battle  of  Waterloo. 
Hugo. 

105  Seven   That   Were 
Hanged.    Andreyev. 

106  Thoughts    and    Aphor- 
isms.     Geo.    Sand. 

107  How  to  Strengthen 
Mind  and 


It8  How   to   Devolop   a 
Healthy   Mind. 

109  How  to  Develop  a 
Strong  Will. 

110  How  to  Develop  a 
Magnetic    Personality. 

111  How  to  Attract 
Friends. 

112  How   to    Be   a    Leader 
of   Others. 

113  Proverbs    of    England. 

114  Proverbs   of  France. 

115  Proverbs  of  Japan. 

116  Proverbs  of  China. 

117  Proverbs  of  Italy. 

118  Proverbs  of  Russia. 

119  Proverbs  of  Ireland. 

120  Proverbs   of  Spain. 

121  Proverbs   of  Arabia. 

122  Debate  on  Spiritual- 
ism. Conan  Doyle  and 
Joseph   McCabe. 

123  Vegetarianism.    Debate 

125  War  Speeches  of 
Woodrow    Wilson. 

126  History   of  Rome.     A. 
F.  Giles. 

127  What  Expectant  Moth- 
ers  Should  Know. 

•  128  Julius    Caesar:     Who       I 
He  Was  and  What  He     I 
Accomplished. 
129  Rome    or   Reason. 

Debate.     Ingersoll  and 
Manning. 
ISO  Controversy   on   Chris- 
tianity.     Debate.      In- 
gersoll  and  Gladstone. 

131  Redemption.      Tolstoi. 

182  Foundations  of  Re- 
ligion. 

183  Principles   of  Elec- 
tricity. 

185  Socialism    for   Million- 
aires.    G.  B.  Shaw. 


186  Child  Training. 

}g  gome  Nursing. 

138  Studies   in    Pessimiaai. 

,,,   Schopenhauer. 

141  Would    Practice    of 
Christ's    Teachings 
Make  for  Social  Pros- 
no  £ess?     Debate. 

142  Bismarck  and  the  Ger- 
man Empire. 

143  Pope   Leo's    Encyclical 
on  Socialism. 

144  Was  Poe  Immoral? 

us  ?ra?  It  Whitman. 

145  Great  Ghost  Stories. 

146  Snowbound.     Whittier. 

147  Cromwell  and  His 
Times. 

148  Strength  of  the  Stroag 
Jack  London. 

151  Man   Who   Would  Be 
,r«  Kms\    KipKng. 

152  Foundations  of  the 
Labor    Movement. 
Wendell  Phillips. 

.  } It  Epigrams  of  Ibsen. 
\ll  ¥a*ims-  Napoleon, 
lob  Andersen  s  Fairv 

Tales. 
157  Marx   vs.   Tolstoi. 

I        n  A .llce ,  in    Wonderland. 

159  Lincoln    and   the 
I    ,_.  Working  Class. 

160  Ingersoll's   Lecture   on 
Shakespeare. 

161  Country  of  the  Blind. 
H.  G.  Wells. 

162  Karl   Marx  and  the 
American  .  Civil   War. 

163  Sex  Life  in  Greece 
and  Rome. 

164  Michael  Angelo's 
Sonnets. 

165  Discovery  of  the 
Future.    H.  G.  Wella. 


166  English    as    She   Is 
Spoke.    Mark  Twain. 

167  Rules  of  Health. 
Plutarch. 

168  Epigrams  of  Oscar 
Wilde. 

169  Church  Property  Be 
Taxed  ?    Debate. 

171  Has    Life    Any    Mean- 
ing ?     Debate. 

172  Evolution  of  Love. 
Ellen  Key. 

178  Vision  of  Sir  Launfal. 
Lowell.  # 

174  Free    Speech    Trial    of 
William   Penn. 

175  Science   of   History. 
Froude.  , 

176  Four  Essays.  Havelock 
Ellis. 

177  Subjection  of  Women. 
John   Stuart  Mill. 

178  One  of  Cleopatra's 
Nights.     Gautier. 

179  Constitution  of  League 
of  Nations. 

180  Epigrams  of  Bernard 
Shaw. 

181  Epigrams   of  Thoreau. 
188  Realism  in  Art  and 

Literature.      Darrow. 
184  Primitive    Beliefs. 

H.    M.    Tichenor. 
186  History  of  Printing. 

Disraeli. 
186  How  I  Wrote  "The 

Raven."     Poe. 
|    187  Whistler's  Humor. 
188  How   Voltaire   Fooled 

Priest  and  King. 

Clarence    Darrow. 
1ft*  Eugenics.     Havelock 

Ellis. 
1*0  Psycho- Analysis — 

The  Key  to  Human 

Behavior.     Fielding. 


191  Evolution  vs.  Religiea, 
Balmforth 

192  Book  of  Synonym*. 
196  How  to   Keep   Well. 

196  The  Marquise. 
George  Sand. 

197  Witticisms  and  Rene*, 
tions.     De   Sevigne. 

198  Majesty  of  Justice. 
Anatole  France. 

200  Ignorant  Philosopher. 
Voltaire. 

201  Satan  and  the  Saints. 
H.    M.    Tichenor. 

202  Survival  of  the  Fittest. 
H.    M.   Tichenor. 

203  Rights   of   Women. 
Havelock    Ellis. 

204  Sun   Worship  and 
Later   Beliefs. 

H.    M.    Tichenor. 

205  Artemus   Ward,   His 
Book. 

206  Debate  on  Capitalism 
vs.  Socialism.  Selfer- 
man    and    Nearing. 

207  Olympian   Gods. 
H.    M.   Tichenor. 

208  Debate  on  Birth  Con- 
trol. Mrs.  Sanger  and 
Winter  Russell. 

209  Aspects  of  Birth  Con- 
trol. Medical,  Moral, 
Sociological.  Dr.  Knopf 

210  The  Stoic  Philosophy. 
Prof.    Gilbert    Murray. 

211  Idea  of  God  in  Natnre. 
John   Stuart  Mill. 

212  Life  and  Character. 
218  Lecture  on    Lincoln. 

Robt.    G.   IngersoD. 

214  Speeches    of    Lincoln. 

215  The   Miraculous   Re- 
venge.   Bernard  Shaw. 

216  Wit  of  Heinrich  Heine. 
George   Bitot. 


218  Four    Essays. 
Jean   Jaures. 

219  The  Human  Tragedy. 
Anatoie  France. 

220  Essays    on   the    New 
Testament.     Robert 
Blatchford. 

221  Women,  and  Four 
Other  Essays.  Maurice 
Maeterlinck. 

222  The  Vampire  and 
Other  Poems.  Rudyard 
Kipling. 

223  Essays   on   Swinburne. 
Sir  Arthur  Quiller- 
Couch. 

W4  God:  The  Known  and 
Unknown.    Samuel 
Butler 

225  On  a  Certain  Conde- 
scension in  Foreigners. 
Jas.  Russell  Lowell. 

226  Professor  Bernhardi : 
Schnitzler. 

227  Keats,  the  Man,  His 
Work  and  His  Friends. 


228  Aphorisms   of   Thomas 
Huxley. 

229  Diderot.  Havelock  Ellis 

230  The  Fleece  of  Gold. 
Theophile  Gautier. 

231  Eight    Humorous 
Sketches.     Samuel 
Clemens    (Mark 
Twain) . 

232  The    Three    Strangers. 
Thos.  Hardy. 

283  Thoughts  on  Litera- 
ture and  Art.   Goethe. 

234  McNeal-Sinclair 
Debate    on    Socialism. 

235  Five  Essays.    Gilbert 
K.   Chesterton. 

236  The  State  and  Heart 
Affairs  of  King 
Henry   VHI. 

237  Poems  in  Prose. 
Baudelaire. 

238  Reflections   6n  Modem 
Science.     Huxley. 

239  Twenty-Six   Men   and 
a  Girl,  and  Other 
Tales.      Maxim    Gorki. 


UNIVERSITY  OF  ILLINOIS-URBANA 

973.7L63B8SCH3A  C001 

ABRAHAM  LINCOLN  AND  THE  WORKING  CLASS  G 


3  0112  031800565 


